Ayurveda Benefits

Besides dealing with principles for maintenance of health, it has also developed a wide range of therapeutic measures to combat illness. These principles of positive health and therapeutic measures related to physical, mental, social and spiritual welfare of human beings. Thus Ayurveda became one of the oldest system of medicine dealing with both the preventive and curative aspects of life in a most comprehensive way.

According to Ayurveda, all objects in the universe including human body are composed of five basic elements (Panchamahabhutas) namely, earth, water, fire, air and vacuum The growth and development of the body matrix depends on its nutrition, i.e., on food. The food, in turn, is composed of the above five elements, which replenish or nourish the like elements of the body after the action of bio-fire (Agni). The tissues of the body are the structural whereas humours are physiological entities, derived from different combinations and permutations of Panchamahabhutas.

Health or sickness depends on the presence or absence of a balanced state of the total body matrix including the balance between its different constituents Both the intrinsic and extrinsic factors can cause disturbance in the natural equilibrium giving rise to disease. This loss of equilibrium can happen by dietary indiscrimination, undesirable habits and non-observance of rules of healthy living. Seasonal abnormalities, improper exercise or erratic application of sense organs and incompatible actions of the body and mind can also result in creating disturbance of the existing normal balance. The treatment consists of restoring the balance of disturbed body-mind matrix through regulating diet, correcting life-routine and behaviour, administration of drugs and resorting to preventive Panchkarma and Rasayana therapy.

In Ayuveda, diagnosis is always done of the patient as a whole. The physician takes a careful note of the patient?s internal physiological characteristics and mental disposition. He also studies such other factors as the affected bodily tissues, humours, the site at which the disease is located, patient?s resistance and vitality, his daily routine, dietary habits, the gravity of clinical conditions, condition of digestion and details of personal, social, economic and environmental situation of the patient. The diagnosis also involves the following examinations:

1.General physical examination

2.Pulse examination

3.Urine examination

4.Examination of the faeces

5.Examination of tongue and eyes

6.Examination of skin and ear including tactile and auditory functions

Treatment of the disease consists in avoiding causative factors responsible for disequilibrium of the body matrix or of any of its constituent parts through the use of Panchkarma procedures, medicines, suitable diet, activity and regimen for restoring the balance and strengthening the body mechanisms to prevent or minimize future occurrence of the disease.

For successful administration of a treatment four things are essential.

These are:

1.The physician

2.The medicaments

3.The nursing personnel

4.The patient

The physician comes first in order of importance. He must possess technical skill, scientific knowledge, purity and human understanding. The physician should use his knowledge with humility, wisdom and in the service of humanity. Next in importance comes food and drugs. These are supposed to be of high quality,grown and prepared following approved procedures and should be available adequately. The third component of every successful treatment is the role of nursing personnel who should have good knowledge of nursing, must know the skills of their art and be affectionate, sympathetic, intelligent, neat & clean and resourceful. The fourth component is the patient himself who should be cooperative and obedient to follow instructions of the physician, able to describe ailments and ready to provide all that may be needed for treatment.

The treatment of disease can broadly be classified as

1.Purification Treatment

2.Palliative Treatment

3.Prescription of diet and activity

4.Avoidance of disease causing and aggravating factors

5.Psychotherapy

6.Rejuvenation medicines

In Ayurveda, regulation of diet as therapy has great importance. This is because it considers human body as the product of food. An individual?s mental and spiritual development as well as his temperament is influenced by the quality of food consumed by him. Thus, food is basic to all the metabolic transformations and life activities. Lack of nutrients in the food leads to a variety of disease conditions.

India has moved forwards in advocating global usefulness of Ayurveda contemporary scenario of health care through global net works. As a result many foreign countries have began looking to India for understanding Ayurveda and incorporating it through education, research and practice to meet the overwhelming desire of people all over the world to access alternative Medicine.