History of Latin American Dermatology

HISTORY OFPEDIATRICDERMATOLOGYIN MEXICORAMÓN RUIZ MALDONADOIn Mexico, as in most countries, adults and children have been — and still are —treated since the nineteenth century at the general Dermatology services, without distinction.Meanwhile, at pediatric hospitals, Dermatology patients have been treated bypediatricians, who, in general, have little training in Dermatology. In the second half ofthe twentieth century, most pediatric hospitals chose to have a general dermatologist asan external consultant, a situation that in most cases continues.Since the 1960s, Mexico’s Children’s Hospital, an emblematical institution of LatinAmerican Pediatrics, has had an Allergy and Dermatology service, whose head was the allergistDr. Luis Gómez Orozco; as a consultant dermatologist, Dr. Roberto Núñez Andradetreated patients for two hours daily, but did not carry out teaching or research work.At that time, Dr. Mario Magaña Lozano treated pediatric patients at the DermatologyService of Mexico’s General Hospital and saw the referrals requested by the PediatricsService of that same hospital.In late 1969, after having completed graduate studies in Dermatology and Dermopathology,I returned from Europe and worked as head of the Dermopathology laboratory,at the institution where years earlier I had carried out specialized studies inDermatology, the Dr. Ladislao de la Pascua Dermatology Center, headed at that time byProf. Fernando Latapí, who was also the head of the Dermatology Service of Mexico’sGeneral Hospital. In that same year, I met Dr. Rigoberto Aguilar Pico, who had just beenappointed head of Mexico’s Children’s Hospital, and he told me that Dr. Núñez Andradewas about to retire, inviting me to take over his post. In those times of the end of PresidentDíaz Ordaz’s sexennium, it was reported that a new hospital center that would replaceMexico’s Children’s Hospital was being built in the south of the City of Mexico. Thehead of the new hospital was to be Dr. Lázaro Benavides Vázquez, who was already interviewingthose who would make up his team. At the end of my first year of work at theChildren’s Hospital, I turned in a report on my activities, and soon afterwards I was invitedto an interview with Dr. Benavides. He offered me the management of the Allergyand Dermatology Service at the new hospital, which was inaugurated on November 6,1970, by the outgoing president, Gustavo Díaz Ordaz and his wife, President of the Boardof the National Institute for the Protection of Children (INPI). The INPI was to be replaced269