Ayush ministry clarifies after 'khichdi medical system' claim by IMA
The Ayush Ministry has issued a clarification with respect to the order allowing Ayurveda PG students to practice surgery. The ministry's clarification comes after the IMA opposed the amendment.
FollowThe controvery surrounding an Ayush ministry notification allowing Ayurveda postgraduate students to practise general surgery, has prompted the ministry to come out with a clarification.
The Ayush ministry clarified that the notification was related to the Shalya and Shalakya streams of Post Graduation Education in Ayurveda.
The Ayush ministry said, "The notification specifies (in clearer terms than the earlier notification on the subject) a total of 58 surgical procedures that PG scholars of these streams (cumulatively) need to be practically trained inso as to enable them to independently perform the said activities after completion of their PG Degree."
"The notification is specific to these specified surgical procedures and does not allow Shalya and Shalakya Post Graduates to take up any other types of surgery."
The ministry made it clear that there is no policy shift in the matter of practice of surgical procedures by practitioners of Ayurveda.
The ministry also clarified that the use of modern terminology in the notification does not amount to “mixing Ayurveda” with conventional or modern medicine.
The Indian Medical Association had lashed out at the move, satating that an integrative system of medicine would create a 'khichdi medical system' and produce hybrid doctors. The body of private practitioners of modern medicine also opposed the Centre's 'one nation one system' policy in medical education and called it a cocktail of disaster.
Clarifying, the ministry said, "All scientific advances including standardized terminologies are inheritances of the entire mankind. No individual or group has monopoly over these terminologies."
"The modern terminologies in the field of medicine, are not modern from a temporal perspective, but are derived substantially from ancient languages like Greek, Latin and even Sanskrit, and later languages like Arabic."
"Evolution of terminologies is a dynamic and inclusive process. Modern medical terms and terminology facilitates effective communication and correspondence not just among physicians, but also to other stake-holders including the public."
"In the instant notification, modern terms are adopted as per requirement to ensure that the same is understood widely in the medical profession, in the stake-holding disciplines like the medico-legal, health IT etc., as well as by the members of the public."
