Clinical diagnosis through paintworks observation

Abstract

Despite of the important technological advances which today allow a precise diagnosis through genetic or imaging studies, one of the fundamental pillars of medical diagnosis is, and always will be, patient examination. The visual identification of the signs that distinguish a disease is still important to make a clinical diagnosis. These very same examination skills and the knowledge on the disorders’ appearance, as well as the technical abilities of the artists that once painted pictures, allow us to diagnose a rosacea among Rembrandt’s self-portraits, or Marfan’s syndrome amidst Egon Schiele’s elongated figures. It is possible to find diseases represented in paintworks from long before someone ever described them in a book, longer even before someone considered them illnesses.