Ana Aslan

The Romanian School of Gerontology was the first in the world to:

• found the first Institute of Geriatrics in the world (on January 22 1952), which has gerontology research and third-age medical assistance as its main object of activity.
• channel its researches on three directions: clinical, experimental and social researches, which structure is nowadays recommended by WHO (Kiev, 1963) as a model for similar institutions.

• Devise a medicine to b efficient for the prevention of the aging process and for the therapy of third-age pathological situations - which is the Gerovital H3.

• devise a therapeutic strategy to prevent and treat aging.

• organize a national health network for the prevention of aging.

The Institute of Gerontology and Geriatrics was founded in 1952 as the first institution of this kind by Decision of the Ministerial Cabinet. In 1974 it became a National Institute and in 1974 it took the name of "Ana Aslan". From its beginnings the Institute was led by Prof. Acad. Ana Aslan M.D.


until 1988. It has had medical geriatric assistance and social gerontology research as main activities. The Institute was commended in 1964 as a model of geriatric institution by WHO.
The Institute was extended in 1974 by a new clinic of outstanding interior and large spaces, located in Otopeni town on an area of 32 ha.

The Institute Headquarter building located on Caldarusani Street Nr.9, Bucharest, is a national architectural patrimony building. It was designed by architect Ion Mincu and it has ceramic decorations in Romanian style.
The first medicine designed to delay human aging was developed between 1946 and 1956 as the result of various clinical and experimental researches by Prof. Ana Aslan and her followers. These results were presented within a work called "Novocain- eutrophic and antiaging factor", published in 1955 together with Prof. C. I. Parhon. One year later, in 1956, "Gerovital" is introduced to international medicine world at the Congress Therapiewoche in Karlsruhe, and then at the Congress on Gerontology in Basel.

International awards - Meritto della Republica Italiana, Knight of the New Europe - Italy, Knight of Maltese Order - France, Commander of Orange Nassau Order - Holland, Dame of Collar of the Saint Graal - France, Citizenship International Award - Philippines, The Prize and the Medal Léon Bernard awarded by WHO for exceptional contributions in the field of social medicine and geriatrics, the Prize of Foundation Franzheim from Franzheim Buckminster Fuller Synergy Trust, which is awarded for scientific activity on public health - the above awards are only a few of the international recognitions of her prodigious activity to serve human health.
Ana Aslan (1897-1988, born in Braila)

studied at the Faculty of Medicine in Bucharest (1915-1922). She was professor of Cardiology at the Faculty of Medicine in Timisoara (1945-1949). Between 1949 and 1952 she was head of department at the Institute of Endocrinology in Bucharest. Starting in 1952 she became General Director of the Institute of Geriatrics. As one of the pioneering scientists in the world on medical gerontology, Ana Aslan focused also on social gerontology. Ana Aslan proposed systematic countermeasures in order to create a system to stimulate third-age people's activities. Ana Aslan became aware of the long-term biotrophic action of Procaine and introduced it as a medicine to be taken in small quantity on long terms, for curing and prophylactic benefits. The Gerovital H3 is the first Romanian original biotrophic product and also the first medicine designed to delay human aging processes. It was developed between 1946 and 1956 by Prof. Ana Aslan and her followers, as a result of numerous clinical and experimental studies.
The results of this study are presented within the work Novo­caine - eutrophic and antiaging factor, published in 1955 in collaboration with Prof. C. I. Parhon. Prof. Ana Aslan's theory was received with skepticism, but it proved its correctness in the years that followed. Her work together with pharmacist Elena Polovrageanu resulted in Gerovital H3, which is a gerontologic medicine designed to reduce aging processes at molecular level and consequently reduce third-age chronic and degenerative diseases. Gerovital was introduced to the international medicine world at The Con­gress Therapiewoche in Karlsruhe, and then at The European Con­­gress of Gerontology in Basel.

From that point, Romanian researches in this field gained international recognition. Tests and comparisons with other similar medicine in the world began.

In 1960 Prof. Ana Aslan started to develop a new product, which apart procaine contained Aslavital, an activating and antiatherogenous factor.

34 years later, in 1985, Prof. Ana Aslan published in "Ro­manian Journal of Gerontology and Geriatrics" her work "Techniques and effects of Gerovital H3 treatment--after 34 years of use". This work is a synthesis of the research made by Prof. Ana Aslan and her followers during this period and points out to the studies made in other countries that confirmed the superiority of the Romanian product on other similar products.

The clinical characteristics of the treatment by procaine on third-age patients are mainly the reduction of depression and anxiety, improvement of the will to live, growth of physical and intellectual capability (especially memory, auditory, visual and olfactive apparata, improvement of the aspect of skin and hair), the reduction of senile specks and keratosis, growth of muscular tonus and articulation mobility, growth and repigmenting of hair, normalization of arterial pressure.

All these clinical observations have been verified by experience. Gerovital was certified to have a stimulatory action on liver regeneration, gastric mucus membrane and bone marrow, and also on the regeneration of striated muscles and peripheral nerves. Gerovital H3 also produces physiologic and morphologic regeneration of striated muscles and peripheral nerves. Studies on nervous dystrophy demonstrated the superior efficiency when the treatment is applied before dystrophy takes place, which fact proves Gerovital H3 efficient to use for prevention purposes.

Using Gerovital H3 on prevention purposes was the basis of the researches on which Ana Aslan proceeded in the field of Social Gerontology. Within the Institute of Geriatrics, a section with a field of activity on medical, social, economic, psychological, demographical, ecological and cultural aspects of the aging process was founded. The geronto-prophylaxis activity was developed at national level and allowed the development of multidisciplinary researches (medicine, psychology, sociology, economy, etc.)

The study of human longevity, intergenerational study with regard to the social image of the aged people, the study of demographical aging are only a few aspects that showed the increasing need for fundamental and applied researches of social gerontology. On this basis, The National Institute for Geriatrics and Gerontology devised in 1997 the National Program for medical and social assistance of aged population in Romania

The results of the researches performed by the group of medics and researchers under the lead of Prof. Ana Aslan were published in journals of international recognition ( Therapeutische Umschau, Revue Française de Gérontologie, Journal of Gerontology, Journal of Pharmacological Experimental Therapy) and also were the object of presentations to international scientific events( Symposium on Theoretical Aspects of Aging, Miami, USA 4th International Symposium of Basic Research in Gerontology in Varnerg, Sweden , 10th International Congress of Gerontology, Jerusalem, Israel the 6th International Congress of Gerontology Denmark, Copenhagen the 11th International Congress of Gerontology Tokyo, Japan) Some results appeared as treatises published at well-known publishers from abroad ( Columbia University Press - New York, Editorial NBP - Buenos Aires, Consultants Bureau Inc. - New York ).

The enormous work of Prof. Ana Aslan as a physician as a researcher, as of her group under her leadership, was unanimously appreciated on international level and was also recognized as an incontestable priority for Romania.

World Health Organization, The Academy of Sciences in New York, Academia Tiberina - Italy, The Global Union for Prophylactic Medicine and Social Hygiene - Austria The Global Council for Urgency Problems - Holland, The American Society of Gerontology, The Confederation of the Societies of Gerontology from the Latin countries - Spain, are only a few of the prestigious global organizations in which Prof. Ana Aslan took part as a member.

History III: Short story of romanian revolution at 1989

History II: Romania in the Middle Ages

After the Roman army and administration left Dacia, the territory was invaded by the Goths, then, in the 4th century by Huns. They were followed by more nomads includingGepids, Avars, Bulgars, Pechenegs, and Cumans.

In the Middle Ages, Romanians lived in three distinct principalities: Wallachia (Romanian: Ţara Românească—"Romanian Land"), Moldavia (Romanian: Moldova) and Transylvania. By the 11th century, Transylvania became a largely autonomous part of the Kingdom of Hungary, and became independent as the Principality of Transylvania from the 16th century, until 1711.^]In the other Romanian principalities, many small local states with varying degrees of independence developed, but only in the 14th century the larger principalities Wallachia (1310) and Moldavia (around 1352) emerged to fight a threat of the Ottoman Empire. Vlad III the Impaler maintained an independent policy in relation to the Ottoman Empire, and, in 1462, defeated Mehmed II's offensive during The Night Attack.

By 1541, the entire Balkan peninsula and most of Hungary became Ottoman provinces. In contrast, Moldavia, Wallachia, and Transylvania, came under Ottoman suzerainty, but conserved fully internal autonomy and, until the 18th century, some external independence. During this period the Romanian lands were characterised by the slow disappearance of the feudal system; the distinguishment of some rulers likeStephen the Great, Vasile Lupu, and Dimitrie Cantemir in Moldavia, Matei Basarab, Vlad III the Impaler, and Constantin Brâncoveanu in Wallachia, Gabriel Bethlen in Transylvania; the Phanariot Epoch; and the appearance of the Russian Empire as a political and military influence.

In 1600, the principalities of Wallachia, Moldova and Transylvania were simultaneously headed by the Wallachian prince Michael the Brave (Mihai Viteazul), Ban of Oltenia, but the chance for a unity dissolved after Mihai was killed, only one year later, by the soldiers of an Austrian army general Giorgio Basta. Mihai Viteazul, who was prince of Transylvania for less than one year, intended for the first time to unite the three principalities and to lay down foundations of a single state in a territory comparable to today's Romania.

After his death, as vassal tributary states, Moldova and Wallachia had complete internal autonomy and an external independence, which was finally lost in the 18th century. In 1699, Transylvania became a territory of the Habsburgs' Austrian empire, following the Austrian victory over the Turks in the Great Turkish War. The Austrians, in their turn, rapidly expanded their empire: in 1718 an important part of Wallachia, called Oltenia, was incorporated to the Austrian monarchy and was only returned in 1739. In 1775, the Austrian empire occupied the north-western part of Moldavia, later called Bukovina, while the eastern half of the principality (calledBessarabia) was occupied in 1812 by Russia.

 

History Of Romania I: Prehistory and Antiquity; The Dacian kingdom

The oldest modern human remains in Europe were discovered in the "Cave With Bones" in present day Romania. The remains are approximately 42,000 years old and as Europe’s oldest remains of Homo sapiens, they may represent the first such people to have entered the continent.  But the earliest written evidence of people living in the territory of the present-day Romania comes from Herodotus in book IV of his Histories (Herodotus) written 440 BCE, where he writes about the Getae tribes.

Dacians, considered a part of these Getae, were a branch of Thracians that inhabited Dacia(corresponding to modern Romania, Moldova and northern Bulgaria). The Dacian kingdom reached its maximum expansion during King Burebista, around 82 BC, and soon came under the scrutiny of the neighboring Roman Empire. After an attack by the Dacians on the Roman province of Moesia in 87 AD, the Romans led a series of wars (Dacian Wars) which eventually led to the victory of Emperor Trajan in 106 AD, and transformed the core of the kingdom into the province of Roman Dacia.

Rich ore deposits were found in the province, and especially gold and silver were plentiful. Which led to Rome heavily colonizing the province. This brought the Vulgar Latin and started a period of intense romanization, that would give birth to the proto-Romanian.  Nevertheless, in the 3rd century AD, with the invasions of migratory populations such as Goths, the Roman Empire was forced to pull out of Dacia around 271 AD, thus making it the first province to be abandoned.

Several competing theories have been generated to explain the origin of modern Romanians. Linguistic and geo-historical analysis tend to indicate that Romanians have coalesced as a major ethnic group both South and North of the Danube. 

Some general informations about Romania...

Romania is a country located in Southeastern and Central Europe, North of the Balkan Peninsula, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea. Almost all of the Danube Delta is located within its territory. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

The territory's recorded history includes periods of rule by Dacians, the Roman Empire, the Bulgarian empire, the Kingdom of Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire. As a nation-state, the country was formed by the merging of Moldavia and Wallachia in 1859 and it gained recognition of its independence in 1878. Later, in 1918, they were joined by Transylvania, Bukovina and Bassarabia. At the end of World War II, parts of its territories (roughly the present day Moldova) were occupied by the USSR and Romania became a member of the Warsaw Pact. With the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, Romania started a series of political and economic reforms.

After a decade of post-revolution economic problems, Romania made economic reforms such as low flat tax rates in 2005 and joined the European Union on January 1, 2007. While Romania's income level remains one of the lowest in the European Union, reforms have increased the growth speed. Romania is now an upper-middle income country economy.

Romania has the 9th largest territory and the 7th largest population (with 21.5 million people) among the European Union member states. Its capital and largest city is Bucharest the 6th largest city in the EU with 1.9 million people. In 2007, Sibiu, a city in Transylvania, was chosen as a European Capital of Culture. Romania also joined NATO on March 29, 2004, and is also a member of the Latin Union, of the Francophonie of the OSCE and an associate member of the CPLP. Romania is a semi-presidential unitary state.

A World Without Romania