New Delhi: The government has issued a notification authorising post-graduate practitioners in specified streams of Ayurveda to be trained to perform surgical procedures such as excisions of benign tumours, nasal and cataract surgeries, a move which has drawn flak from the modern medicine fraternity.
The November 20 gazette notification by the Central Council of Indian Medicine (CCIM), a statutory body under the AYUSH Ministry to regulate the Indian systems of medicine, listed 39 general surgery procedures and around 19 procedures involving the eye, ear, nose and throat by amending the Indian Medicine Central Council (Post Graduate Ayurveda Education) Regulations, 2016.
The Indian Medical Association (IMA), the largest body of modern medicine doctors, has condemned the move, describing it as “poaching the disciplines of modern medicine through back door means” and a “retrograde step of mixing the systems”.
Demanding that the order be withdrawn, the IMA urged the CCIM to develop their own surgical disciplines from their own ancient texts and not claim the surgical disciplines of modern medicine as their own.
Attempting to clarify the notification, AYUSH Ministry Secretary Vaidya Rajesh Kotecha said it does not amount to any policy deviation or any new decision.
“This notification is more of the nature of a clarification. It streamlines the existing regulation relating to post graduate education in Ayurveda with respect to the specified procedures.
“Further, the notification does not open up the entire field of surgery to Ayurveda practitioners and specifies a set of surgical procedures. It outlines that not all post-graduates of Ayurveda can perform these procedures. Only those specialised in Shalya and Shalakya are allowed to perform these surgical procedures,” Kotecha said.
Chairman of Board of Governors, CCIM, Vaidya Jayant Devpujari said that these surgical procedures were being performed in Ayurveda institutes for over 20 years and the notification legalises them.
“The purpose of bringing out the notification is also to set boundaries by specifying the list of procedures so that practitioners restrict themselves to the set of surgical procedures as mentioned in the regulation,” Devpujari said.
The AYUSH ministry also issued a clarification stating the notification is a clarification of the relevant provisions in the previously existing regulations of 2016 and that the use of modern terminology in the said notification does not amount to “mixing” of Ayurveda with conventional (Modern) medicine.
“Since beginning, Shalya and Shalakya are independent Departments in Ayurveda colleges, performing such surgical procedures.
“While the notification of 2016 stipulated that the students shall undergo training of investigative procedures, techniques and surgical performance of procedures and management in the respective specialty, the details of these techniques, procedures and surgical performance were laid down in the syllabus of respective PG courses issued by CCIM, and not the regulation per se,” the clarification stated.
The present clarification was issued in overall public interest by CCIM by bringing the said details into the regulation. Hence this does not signify any policy shift, it stated.
The ministry also said, “All scientific advances including standardized terminologies are inheritances of the entire mankind. No individual or group has monopoly over these terminologies.”
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, it said.
“Evolution of terminologies is a dynamic and inclusive process,” the AYUSH ministry said, adding use of modern terminology in the said notification does not amount to “mixing” of Ayurveda with conventional (Modern) medicine.
The notification issued by the Central Council of Indian Medicine stated, “These regulations may be called the Indian Medicine Central Council (Post Graduate Ayurveda Education) Amendment Regulations, 2020.
“In the Indian Medicine Central Council (Post Graduate Ayurveda Education) Regulations, 2016, in regulation 10, after sub-regulation (8), the following sub-regulation shall be inserted, namely — During the period of study, the PG scholar of Shalya and Shalakya shall be practically trained to acquaint with as well as to independently perform the following activities so that after completion of his PG degree, he is able to perform the following procedures independently,” it read.
According to the notification, the procedures listed include removal of metallic and non-metallic foreign bodies from non-vital organs, excision of simple cyst or benign tumours (lipoma, fibroma, schwanoma etc) of non-vital organs, amputation of gangrene, traumatic wound management, foreign body removal from stomach, squint surgery, cataract surgery and functional endoscopic sinus surgery.
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Medical science is all about experience.The ayurveda surgeons will be trained properly itself and then allowed to do some basic surgeries like cataract.The ancient ayurveda books has clearly dealt with eye surgery already.There is a huge dearth of doctors in India itself,so training a few to do some basic treatment like malaria,dysentry,wound cleaning wont make a difference.Again there are instances when properly trained doctors couldnt deliver what they were expected to.So can you really trust anybody that blindly? Trained or untrained.And most importantly both BAMs,MBBS and biological science graduates follow the same books.Bookish knowledge never makes a succesful doctor…Its all about EXPERIENCE AND PRACTICE.
Given the fear of Indian public about success rates of surgeries (especially in the elderly) this move by the government will scare patients in India even more. At least for those patients who do their own research and being doubly sure before allowing themselves to undergo any type of surgery. Those who go by blind faith in the surgeon
(Be it llopath or ayurved) of course they will not face any anxiety about all this.
Ayush proponents like Mr Patwardhan and Mr Kotecha and organisations like CCIM should read Karl Popper’s philosophy on science. I think it will stimulate them into understanding why modern medicine is evidence based and why so much emphasis is placed on how to falsify claims.
If we as a country attempt to modernize ayurveda in a scientific manner, with high quality research and high standards of evidence, that will help ayurveda to discard what is irrelevant in this age and gain more acceptability in modern medicine.
More details are required how these surgeons are going to do the surgery – are they going to do it the old-fashioned way or they are going to use allopathic drugs. If they are going to use allopathic drugs then it is mixing 2 systems – one based on science and the other one not proven by science.
Agreed science is not a monopoly of any one group. But then the Ayush group should explain their theories in the terms of science and evidence based medicine. They very well know science and their Ayush theories are irreconciliable. But they want to associate with science selectively.
The Ayush ministry does not give heed to the point that science is not a belief system. The purpose of science is to falsify beliefs. However for Ayush, their beliefs are truths that are not to be questioned or falsified by science.
Lakhs of MBBS doctors start practise after finishing course by paying crores as donation…
Most of them pass without seeing enough OPs and most of them pass without doing any minor procedure even…
They don’t even see a surgery during their course
MBBS doctors do not do surgery…
Capitation fee to study a course is a different problem. There are 50-60k seats in NEET out of which half are government college seats.
There are only about 30-40,000 surgeons in India and nearly 13-14,000 anaesthetists.
Instead of mixopathy, the better alternative is for the government to increase number of seats in government medical colleges or open more colleges so that more students get opportunity to study and practise modern medicine at UG and PG levels. This will certainly help quite a few upper caste students who could not get seats in government colleges and private colleges on merit due to reservations. So they will get trained in modern medicine from the start itself.
SURGERY IS NOT A TAG OF ALLOPATHIC , HOMOEOPATHY OR AURVEDA, IT IS SIMPLY A SUBJECT , WHO SOEVER PASSED THE EXAMS OF SURGERY BY THEORY AND PRACTICALS CAN PRACTICE SURGERY
where is the list?
I will never submit my family and myself to surgery under an ayurvedic trained doctor for any serious surgery.
This is not about just cutting the body up. It is all about knowing biochemistry, cells, tissues, biophysics in depth aided by medical devices and diagnostics which medical science knows and ayurveda doesnt. Ayurveda is not a science. It is a pseudoscience.
Just shut Ur mouth idiot …in Ayurveda 1st year itself we study modern Anatomy,physiology ,and biochemistry ..and and 5 Ayurveda subject total subjects in 1st year r 8 …and for MBBS only 3 subjects for first year ..
Ayurveda is not pseudoscience ….it’s the way of healthy and long life
And Ur knowledge ..is pseudoknowledge idiot
Well said….. Pseudo knowledge he had takem
Can you explain your doshas and pittas in terms of physiology or biochemistry? If you cannot then it is not science.
Just by adding these subjects to your curriculum doesn’t give you scientific mindset. If you believed in the Scientific method then only you will have the mindset, then you would find ayurvedic knowledge of cause of disease in most cases is not at all valid in today’s time and age.
Exactly. Well said !
Get your facts checked before you comment. What doctor you want to choose is totally upon your discretion. But are called BAMS a pseudoscience! Just go and check the syllabus of BAMS and then comment.
It should also be made mandatory that all these stupid and uneducated policy makers be allowed medical cover only by these ayurvedic surgeons and not allowed to get treatment form anywhere else. This madness makes me sick. Playing with people’s lives again. How low can the system stop in our country….
Not at all. This week lay ground for further degradation of Doctors’ fraternity which already degraded due to malpractices.