Background and purpose: In Persian medicine, thirst is regarded as a disease and its different aspects including the causes, mechanisms and treatment options are explained. The aim of this study was to determine the Persian medicine and conventional medicine view of thirst and its etiology to help researchers in clinical studies.

Materials and methods: A search was conducted in Persian medical textbooks using thirst as the keyword. Then an electronic search was done in databases including pubmed, google scholar, Scopus, and SID using the following keywords:  thirst, etiology, and physiology. After extracting the data, the results were presented in concepts and tables.

Conclusion: Thirst is the feeling of needing to drink water and Persian medicine has different divisions for this feeling. Many of these divisions are formed based on the causes of thirst which are divided into bodily and nonbodily causes. Bodily causes include: ill-tempered, swelling, and obstruction and non-bodily causes include some medications or having certain foods.

Result: Persian medicine and conventional medicine share similar views about thirst. However, compared to Persian medicine, conventional medicine does not address some causes of thirst. Therefore, traditional Persian medical textbooks are believed to be useful in treatment of patients.