The history of IC dates back to the 18th century:

Interstitial cystitis has been talked about for years now, but does anyone know about its history. Interstitial cystitis has a long and complicated history. The history of IC is as fascinating and mysterious as Osama Bin Laden’s killing by the US army. The history of IC dates back to the 18th century. Even after 400 years the etiology of IC remains obscure. What makes IC so mysterious? Often, after patients are diagnosed with IC, they get frustrated by the lack of knowledge about IC in the medical community.

It appears that the first case of IC was reported in 1836 by Mercier. The term “interstitial cystitis” was coined by Skene in 1887 in his book ‘Diseases of the Bladder and Urethra in women’

The era of 1900-1950 was regarded as the “formative years”, since most research on IC was done during this period. Fenwick, Hunner, Bumpus contributed their own theories for the ulcers, which appear on the bladder wall, of which Hunner’s work was pivotal, as he documented bladder epithelial damage and the related blood vessel transitions.

IC has always been regarded as a “woman’s disease”. In 1994, it was first accepted as a disease that affected men as well

Then came the “Dark Years”. From 1957 to 1987, the research in IC had slowed down due to the misguided belief of the medical community that it was of psychosomatic origins. Walsh, in 1970, first described the term “glomerulations” referring to the small petechial hemorrhages on the bladder wall. Messing and Stanley did not agree with Walsh’s findings, altering the perception of IC irrevocably by recognizing glomerulations as the primary indicators of the disease

With the “dark years” gone, the research in IC kept growing deeper with new breakthroughs. In 1998, IC was accepted as one of the most challenging conditions known to the urology world.

Symptoms of IC have always been complicated and have kept varying from person to person. In our next article, we tell all about the symptoms of IC and how the rarer symptoms could lead to rhetorical diagnosis of IC