History of Latin American Dermatology

Dermatology and dermatologists in Brazilshifts, on working days, with emergency services available on holidays and weekends.Since it is a referral hospital, the Service receives many patients to be treated at the tertiarylevel, concentrating on systemic pathologies with more difficult cases.Sanitary Dermatology Outpatient OfficeIt was created in 1975 by Dr. César Duílio Varejão Bernardi, a disciple of Prof. ClóvisBopp and professor of the Dermatology course of the RS Federal University. Under the directionof the State’s Health Secretariat, he founded this service for the training of newdermatologists, having dermatological diseases of sanitary interest as its priority, and emphasison STDs and hanseniasis. However, in 1987, by government ruling, the hospitalarea used for the hospitalization of patients was donated to the STDs/AIDS sector, to beused in the treatment of HIV carriers; therefore, the activities of the medical residencywere momentarily interrupted. However, in 1997, the Residency Program was resumedand was certified by the BSD the following year. At present, the service has the support ofthe State government as a training center in Dermatology, with a capacity for two vacanciesper year. Dr. Cecilia Cassal Corrêa is the coordinating dermatologist of the Service.Rio Grande do Sul also has the certified services of the Santa Clara Polyclinic, withProf. Cláudio José Bartelle as Head of Service.Santa CatarinaSanta Catarina has the certification of the University Hospital of the Federal University(Head of Service, Prof. Jorge José de Souza Filho).■ The History of RADLA (Annual Gathering of LatinAmerican Dermatologists of the Southern Cone)The History of RADLA (Annual Gathering of Latin American Dermatologists of the SouthernCone)From a conversation among Drs. J. Gatti, P. Viglioglia, O. Mangano and S. Sampaiocame the idea of organizing the first meeting of Latin American dermatologists of theSouthern Cone, which took place in Argentina in 1973. It was also decided that the meetingwould be annual, except on those years when it would coincide with the Ibero-LatinAmerican Congress of Dermatology (CILAD).In 2001, in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, Professor Júlio César Empinotti presided over theTwenty-First RADLA, with the participation of the largest number of doctors in the wholehistory of the event. (See RADLA’s History.)Some diseases and their treatment■ Some diseases and their treatmentLeprosy and STDsAn old colleague of Carlos Chagas at the Oswaldo Cruz Institute, Eduardo Rabello, asInspector General of Leprosy, was assigned the mission of drafting the first Brazilian legislationfor the prophylaxis of venereal diseases around 1920. These were ailments thatmade patients suffer not only the consequences of the disease, but also the negative effectsof the public´s lack of information and the backwardness of the predominant mindset.The black immigration was supposed to be responsible for the introduction of leprosy,as Manoel Santos points out, in reference to the Pernambuco calamities from 1707 to1715. According to this author, however, blacks contracted leprosy when already inBrazil, where it had possibly been brought by the Portuguese who had contracted it inthe places of high incidence of the disease in the sixteenth century: Madeira Island, theAzores, the Moroccan possessions and the Lusitanian Indies. A Portuguese doctor, Aleixo107