Professor Jairo Ramos: founding editor

EDITORIAL

Professor Jairo Ramos – Founding editor

Evandro Tinoco Mesquita

Universidade Federal Fluminense - Rio de Janeiro, RJ - Brazil

^{Mailing Address}

Besides our mission to disseminate reliable information about the work being done on cardiovascular diseases in Brazil and to incorporate this knowledge into daily practice, Archives has the important commitment to preserve the landmarks of our cardiology. Archives was founded during Brazil’s difficult post-war era, the very moment of transition to modern cardiology.

The Brazilian Society of Cardiology (BSC) owes much to its predecessors who helped build Brazilian cardiology. Among them we underscore the important role of the "progenitor" of Archives, Professor Jairo de Almeida Ramos, who was also one of the founders of BSC and later elected president of our society for the term of 1955-1956.

Professor Dr. Jairo de Almeida Ramos was the founding editor of the Brazilian Archives of Cardiology, launched the first quarter of 1948, during the administration of Dr. Octavio Magalhães. Another interesting historic note is that the name "Archives" was suggested by Dr. Jairo Ramos. Our first edition consisted of 600 copies, with seven articles covering 112 pages. Three outstanding assistant editors shared the work of editing: Luiz V. Decourt, Reinaldo Marcondes, and Leovigildo de Mendonça de Barros. The important role of Dr. Ramos as Archives director took place from January 1948 until December 1953.

During its 56 years, Archives has circulated uninterruptedly, progressing from a quarterly, up to 1960, to a bimonthly until 1978, and becoming a monthly journal as of 1979.

The launching of Archives was translated as below by our founding editor in the first editorial, which envisaged the consolidation of our magazine and the future of the BSC:

Today, with the publication of the first edition of "Archives," we are realizing one of the great aspirations of the Brazilian Society of Cardiology.

Published under the auspices of this association, it marks the initial phase traversed and reaffirms its aim to encourage studies and research in cardiology in Brazil.

The Board, through its Editorial Council, will select the articles to be published to ensure that a high scientific level is upheld. "Archives" will not really be an official publication of the Brazilian Society of Cardiology, as it will not be accountable for publishing all the papers submitted to its yearly meetings. It, therefore, will not require the authors of the papers to be published to be members. Its pages will be open to all those who truly contribute to the advancement of cardiology.

ACADEMIC LIFE

Professor Emeritus Jairo Ramos (1900-1972) had a distinguished role as a leader in education, in activities associated with medicine, and as a successful doctor and writer in the field. His training as a general practitioner and also his pioneering in cardiology, was marked by his particular interest in the teaching of propedeutics and therapeutics.

Professor Ramos was one of the founders (1933) of the Escola Paulista de Medicina (EPM – Paulista School of Medicine), occupying the chair for Clinical Propedeutics. His broad vision as doctor and educator led him to act strongly in changing the paradigm of the traditional French school – mightily based on humanistic values – to the model focused on technique and scientific advances, the American school that was emerging – incorporating into his academic activity that which he considered the best elements of both schools for the entire practice of medicine. His view of excellence and his appreciation of medical specialization based the consolidation of a core of excellence of postgraduate education in our country.

The creation of the Department of Clinical Medicine at the EPM was a milestone in the evolution of education in medicine in Brazil, impelling the qualification of professors and stimulating specialization in international centers. The aid that the Department received from the Rockefeller and Kellog foundations made possible the installation a research laboratory and facilitated sending young professors abroad for training, thus ensuring better remuneration for the senior professors.

Faculty members began to open offices to attend private patients in the university hospital. Many did residencies abroad. In the area of cardiology, we point to the following colleagues: Silvio Borges (1948-1950), Cantídio de Moura Campos Filho (1949-1952), Ítalo Domingos Lê Vocci (1947-1948), at the National Cardiology Institute of Mexico.

Clinical research groups and bases for structuring Residency (begun in 1957) and stricto sensu postgraduate programs (accredited in the 1970s):

Training abroad, particularly in American organizations, always offers opportunity to really profit from the experience, stemming from three conditions: learning about subjects that they would not have time to study here, discipline in study that will later lead to self-teaching about things we need throughout life, and learning about new environments and other people, which lifts us up out of intellectual "servility" and thus opens to learning about the good in our ambiances and in the people we come to know.

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

Along with his active participation in EPM, Dr. Ramos had a very busy private practice, which, for him, became a prolongation of his academic work what with the constant presence of medical students in close touch with his patients. His effective defense of the profession was notable in helping found the Paulista Medical Association, uniting his Paulista (city of São Paulo) colleagues in defense of improved work conditions.

In 1951, together with Alípio Correa Neto and Hilton Rocha, Dr. Ramos took part in founding the Brazilian Medical Association. At the same time, he helped create the Regional Council of Medicine and was member-founder Brazilian Association of Medical Schools.

The life of the doctor is essentially social. It functions to uplift man and protect him against the hardships that affect the soma and the psyche. Nothing affects man’s psyche more than the incomprehension of society. Nothing affects the soma more than the social imbalances conditioned by lack of assistance to and protection of the common man.

PUBLICATIONS

Published in 1957, Professor Ramos' important book Atualização terapêutica (Therapeutic Update) is now in its 198th edition and is still one of the medical books most sold in our country. In the preface, the author points to the importance of therapeutics in medical training:

There are those that say that therapeutics is what puts doctors on equal footing. That is a malicious and illusory comment. Symptomatic therapeutics makes all doctors equal; while specific therapeutics differentiate good doctors from the bad. It distinguishes doctors that prefer a prior and secure diagnosis to a hurried, merely symptomatic diagnosis.

Today, with a view to encouraging young doctors, the Ramos family has donated profit from the sale of this book to the Jairo Ramos prize, awarded each year by the Paulista Medical Association¹.

In addition to his important work as editor of Archives, Dr. Ramos was also the founder of the Brazilian Journal of Medicine.

Therefore, more than an effort to preserve the legacy of Professor Jairo Ramos, Archives takes pride in narrating the story of a pioneering cardiologist that dedicated himself toward building our magazine, a publication that has been fundamental to scientific dissemination and to the consolidation of Brazilian cardiology.

REFERENCE

1. Disponível em: <www.apm.org.br>

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  13 Feb 2006
• Date of issue
  Jan 2006