The purpose of this work is to make a brief review of the recent history of health advertising, of the legal basis of its control, of experience accumulated and of future perspectives in this field. Reference is made to the most frequent problems relating to the content of the advertising messages and the need is underlined for the Foral Community of Navarra to be able to legislate on the health advertising referring to the Health Centres, Services and Establishments, explicitly delimiting the criteria that will guarantee fulfillment of the principles of truthfulness, exactness, transparency, loyal competition and health protection.