The Declaration of Independence begins with the following paragraph [1]:
When in the course of human events,
it becomes necessary for one people to
dissolve the political bands which have
connected them with another, and to
assume among the powers of the earth,
the separate and equal station to which
the Laws of Nature and of Nature�s God
entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions
of mankind requires that they should declare
the causes which impel them to the separation.
In the spirit of the preceding paragraph and in the name of all modern practitioners of genitourinary imaging, I propose to set forth below the events and reasons that now force a separation of the modern era of imaging urinary lithiasis from all that has gone before. A wondeful (and complete) review of the history of imaging of the urinary tract is given by Howard Pollack in the latest edition of the textbook he edited entitled, "Clinical urography: an atlas and textbook of urological imaging [2]." In what follows, I have used this review as a guide and a source of historical references in the literature.