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Medicine & Philosophy

Medical System

Traditionally, Ayurveda has eight specialisation branches that work jointly in an overall approach that is at once curative, palliative, preventive and educational:

  1. Internal medicine (including the deep elimination procedures and pharmacology)
  2. Pediatrics, gynecology and obstetrics
  3. ENT and facial surgery
  4. Surgery
  5. Toxicology
  6. Regeneration of the body and immunity reinforcement
  7. Fertility and procreation
  8. Treatment of conditions of supernatural origin

Over the centuries, Ayurveda has developed on a basis of empirical as well as factual medicine (evidence-based medicine or EBM) — of which witness such data-bases as DHARA and the AYUSH RESEARCH PORTAL.

The traditional professional hierarchy of Ayurveda covers both the strictly medical domain (ayurvedic doctors) and the paramedical (ayurvedic therapists and nurses). The profession of pharmacist in ayurvedic medicine is evolving as a specific specialisation parallel with the ayurvedic pharmaceutical industry.

Medical Art

In Ayurveda, health is defined as a balance between the body, mind and soul, in harmonious relation with the social environment and nature:

“A person whose functional principles (doṣa), digestive fire (agni), tissues (dhātu), excretions (mala) as well as their activities are normal and whose soul, sense organs and mind are calm and clear, is called healthy (svastha)”

[suṣruta samhitā, su, IV/10]

Traditional ayurvedic literature conveys a wide-ranging understanding of physiology, of physiopathology and of the pathological process in a different light from modern western medicine. Ayurveda draws on its own efficient diagnostic, preventive and therapeutic tools, enabling reliable design of treatment protocols and prognostics.

The list of successfully treated pathologies is a long one. While Ayurveda’s main claim to fame is its efficacy with chronic pathologies, it is also highly effective in acute diseases.

The medical art of Ayurveda is characterized by

  • an individualized approach based on the study of the patient’s individual constitution (preventive medicine) and pathophysiological disorders (curative medicine)
  • a holistic concept that takes the human organism as an inseparable entity of body, mind and soul
  • respect for mankind in the environment, in the social and professional contexts, and as an integral part of nature; being of natural origin, remedies have few side-effects and cause no pollution of the environment.

The therapeutic tools of Ayurveda are

  • prescription of simple or complex medicinal preparations whose ingredients are mostly vegetal (based on one of the widest-ranging pharmacopeias in existence), but also mineral and animal
  • numerous manual treatment techniques and ayurvedic massage, many involving external application of medicinal preparations
  • deep elimination procedures of the organism (pañca karma)
  • individualized advice in nutrition therapy
  • psycho-spiritual therapies
  • individualized advice for healthy living (svasthavṛtta)

As a medical system, Ayurveda transmits on one hand self-knowledge – which is essential for maintaining health – and on the other hand a wide-ranging art of medicine designed to treat pathophysiological imbalances in order to restore health, or else to reduce or stabilize the pathological process. Where this is not possible, Ayurveda offers palliative treatments for maintaining or indeed improving the quality of life.

Philosophy

Ayurveda, a contraction of ayu (life) and veda (knowledge), describes the human being as an indivisible entity of body, mind and soul, subject to the same laws as the environment and the rest of the cosmos, being an integral part of it. The essence is the soul, part of the universal soul and by nature divine, present in each individual as well as in every manifestation.

Ayurveda defines health as a balance between a person’s body, mind, and soul, in harmony with the social and natural environment.

Ayurveda takes its spiritual and philosophical knowledge from the great works of vedic philosophy, the six darśana (nyāya, viśeṣa, sāṅkhya, yoga, mīmāṃsa and vedānta). These mutually complementary philosophical perspectives, derived from the unfathomable treasure of the veda (India’s traditional knowledge system, perhaps the hugest one of human civilization), offer a complete overview and understanding of cosmology with all its material and immaterial phenomena.

While the philosophical roots of Ayurveda are derived from the six darśana, the philosophical principals underlying the science of Ayurveda, are taught under padārtha vijñāna.  They define the cosmic processes and rules and constitute the foundation without which no science can sustain.

The philosophical foundations define in detail the guiding principles for acquiring, verifying and transmitting knowledge, which constitute essential benchmarks in the fields of research and teaching.