Written around 990 A.D., Hidayat-MllIaallemill Fit Tibb (Student's Guide ill Medicine) is the oldest general medical text known to have been written in modern Persian. Little is known of the author other than the fact that he was apparently a well experienced practicing physician by the name of Abu Bah Rabi' bin Ahmad al-Akhawaini from Bukhara who claimed to bea second generation student of Razi. The neuropsychiatric sections of the book are of particular interest because the author apparently had a personal interest in and reputation for treating the insane. According to one of the manuscripts he was known as the "Physician of the Insane" by his contemporaries. Following the line of other Islamic medical writers, the author has described the major neuropsychiatric disorders in the chapter dealing with the "Diseases of the Head and Brain". These include Melancholia, Mania, Epilepsy, Phrenitis, Lethargy, and Delerium. Hysteria is, however, described among the diseases of the female reproductive system. Both the terminology used and the authorities quoted betray the author's schooling in and devotion to the Graeco-Roman medical traditions adopted by early Islamic medical writers. He emerges as a hard-headed organic physician dedicated to the humoral doctrines of mental illness.

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