Abstract

RELEVANCE OF ‘SHISHYOPANAYANEEYA ADHYAYA’ OF ASHTANGA SAMGRAHA SOOTRASTHANA IN COMPREHENSIVE AND ETHICAL MEDICAL EDUCATION

*Dr. Vidyanand Mohan MD (Ay.), Dr. Aparna Nandakumar MD (Ay.), Dr. Aneesh E.G MD (Ay.) and Dr. Abitha Edathadathil MD (Ay.)

Abstract

Medical education is always considered as a sector which requires adeptness. It exemplifies the divine touch of God in the aspirants who are going to relieve sufferings of human beings in the form of physical and mental ailments. The aspirants should get involved in the medical schools by investing hardships to acquire the sacred knowledge of medicine. It is equally important to develop self-discipline, dedication, perseverance and empathy by every medico who wilfully selected this profession. In present era qualification to earn medical education is determined based on either subject merit or financial thrust of the student. Ayurveda, the indigenous medical science is having a unique way in selection of student for learning medical science and it always upholds the diligence of medical students backed by good ethical conducts. Acharya Vagbhata gives a detailed description about fitness of a student for medical education and also highlights about the necessity of comprehensive and ethical way of upbringing a competent medical practitioner. The name given for this chapter is „Shishyopanayaneeya’ which falls under Sootrasthana of Ashtanga Samgraha. In present days „Shishyopanayana Ceremony’ is conducted as an initiation to learn Ayurveda for the new comers and unfortunately the ceremony gets winded up with mere performance of rituals. Thus an attempt is made to analyze the desired qualities of students fit for medical education as per Ayurveda.

Keywords: Ayurveda, Shishyopanayana, Medical Education.