Ayurveda is the science of life, and if life is to be healthy, fulfilling, and complete no part of it can be neglected. This is the central principal of ayurvedic treatment, that the patient be treated as a whole human being. The three most basic parts of a human being are their body, mind, and spirit, and ayurvedic treatment seeks to care for the body, balance the mind, and refine the spirit. A healthy human being will have healthy parts, and within the science of Ayurveda health is determined by the natural balance of the three doshas within the body, mind, and spirit. The doshas are the fundamental elements from which all things are composed, and an imbalance of these elements within a human being results in the ailments which all medicine aims to treat. Therefore, ayurvedic treatment aims to restore the balance natural to every human being, and it does this by a variety of methods.

ayurvedic treatment, as with any medicine, begins with diagnosis and proceeds to prescription. Ayurvedic diagnosis is generally two fold, first the current state of the patient is determined, and secondly the history of the patient and the disease or ailment in question. The former method for diagnosis recommended by Charaka Samhita (Charaka’s Compilation) is tenfold and designates as many aspects of the patient to be examined in the course of diagnosis.

The ten are:

• constitution
• abnormality
• essence
• stability
• body measurements
• diet suitability
• psychic strength
• digestive capacity
• physical fitness
• age

The several methods used to examine the patient under these particular aspects fall into two general categories. The first is an examination of the general state or constitution of the patient, which begins with an examination of the pulses of the three doshas. Following this is the examination of the bodily fluids, urine, feces, and saliva, and then specific operations and reactions of the body, i.e. speech, gait, and reaction to palpitation and percussion.

Second is an examination of the bodies systems, the digestive, respiratory, circulatory and heart, nervous, sensory, urinary, musculo-skeletal, reproductive, and integumentary systems. Through this the nature of the particular imbalance which is responsible for a given ailment can be determined. Ayurvedic treatment follows from the determination of this imbalance to the restoration of balance of the doshas within the patient.

Following this, the details and history of the ailment will be taken into account. This will include the circumstances and frequency of symptoms, mitigating and aggravating factors, and additional medicines being taken. In addition to this, one’s family history with a given disease may be considered, as well as the life cycle of the disease, in order to determine its development and likely course of further development. Taking all these things into account ayurvedic medicine proceeds to prescribe a number of different types of treatment.

Ayurvedic treatment approaches the patient as a whole by treating each of its parts in coordination. Treatment will often include any number of a variety of herbal concoctions, relaxation and meditative therapy, and changing of dietary and exercise habits. Through the integration of the proper changes in all aspects of life ayurvedic treatments restore balance to the whole individual.