NOSOLOGY.

The article focuses on nosology, the branch of medicine concerned with the classification of diseases. During the eighteenth century, nosology was central to formal medical knowledge. Calling a disease measles rather than smallpox implies the existence of some classification criteria. It has been implied in the physiological concepts of disease that a disease cannot be understood apart from a particular individual suffering from it. It has been viewed that in spite of their variable courses and symptoms in individual patients, diseases are specific entities which can be precisely described by astute physicians.