One-hundred-seventy-five years of Neapolitan contributions to the fight against the muscular diseases

369 Following the suggestions of many friends who solicited me to spread the contribution of the Neapolitan physicians in the field of muscular dystrophies, I am proud – as Neapolitan to participate, for more than 50 years, to the activities of Neapolitan Social Associations and Research Institutes. The most significant events occurred in Naples or linked to Neapolitan researchers are summarized in Table 1. In such a list, the main event was the paper written by Gaetano Conte, in 1836, describing the first two cases of severe pseudo-hypertrophic muscular dystrophy, later called Duchenne muscular Dystrophy. Unfortunately such a paper appeared in a Neapolitan Medical Journal and, of consequence, almost completely ignored by the scientific community. It was quoted by Schmidt in 1839 and by Victor Dubowitz in 1978. My coworker, Vito Petretta, was able to find the original article of Conte in the National Library of Naples, at the beginning of 1986. Therefore a re-edition was made in Cardiomyology in 1986, causing a debate on the paternity of the first description of muscular dystrophy: Conte (1836), Meryon (1852) or Duchenne (1868)? Nowadays, eleven years after the second edition in Acta Myologica, we decided to re-publish in this issue the original paper of G. Conte, because the young researchers do not know Gaetano Conte and the old have probably forgotten him. For people not familiar with the Italian language, a short English edition of the article will take place at the end of Editorial. In order to remember Gaetano Conte, the Gaetano Conte Academy was established in Naples by my coworkers and I, with the aim to promote scientific progress and social co-operation in the field. In 1991, the Gaetano Conte Academy instituted the “G. Conte Prizes” to award scientists giving important contributions to scientific progress in the field of primary diseases of the myocardium and skeletal muscles. The first edition of the “G. Conte Prizes” was in 1991; since that date, they have been assigned every two years, in the occasion of the Congresses of the Mediterranean Society of Myology. The next G. Conte Prizes will be awarded during the X Congress of the Mediterranean Society of Myology, that will be held in Pisa, at the end of the April 2011. The list of the scientists who received the G. Conte Prizes is reported in Table 2. Editorial