Ayurvedic system of medicine

The Ayurvedic Medicinal System is a system of traditional medicine native to the Indian subcontinent and practiced in other parts of the world as a form of conventional medicine. The earliest literature on the Indian medical practice appeared during India’s Vedic period. Ayurvedic treatment of disease consists of the healthful use of drugs, diets and certain practices. Medicinal preparation is invariably complex mixtures, based mostly on plant products. Around one thousand plants are used in various Ayurvedic preparations. Many Indian medicinal plants have come under scientific scrutiny since the middle of the nineteenth century, albeit in a periodic fashion. According to Ayurveda, all objects in the universe, including the human body, are composed of five basic elements: water, fire, earth, air and vacuum. There is a balanced condensation of these elements in different proportions to suit the needs and requirements of different structures and functions of the body matrix and its parts. The growth and development of the body matrix depend on its nutrition, i.e., 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 body tissues are structural, whereas humours are the physiological entities derived from different combinations and permutations of five basic elements. The treatment of a disease consists of avoiding causative factors responsible for their disequilibrium of the body matrix or 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. Normally treatment measures involve medicines, a specific diet and a prescribed activity routine. In one treatment approach, the three measures antagonize the disease by counteracting the disease’s etiological factors and various manifestations. In the second approach, the same three medicines, diet and activity measures, are targeted to exert effects similar to the diseases process of etiological factors and manifestations. These two therapeutic approaches are known as Vipreeta and Vipreetarthkari treatments.