Editing History of medicine (section)

=== Ancient Indian medicine ===
{{Main|Ayurveda|Unani|Siddha medicine}}
The [[Atharvaveda]], a sacred text of [[Hinduism]] dating from the middle [[Vedic age]] (c. 1200–900 BCE),<ref>{{citation | last = Flood | first = Gavin | year = 1996 | title = An Introduction to Hinduism | publisher = Cambridge University Press | isbn = 978-0-521-43878-0 | author-link = Gavin Flood | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=KpIWhKnYmF0C}}</ref> is one of the first Indian texts dealing with medicine. It is a text filled with magical charms, spells, and incantations used for various purposes, such as protection against demons, rekindling love, ensuring childbirth, and achieving success in battle, trade, and even gambling. It also includes numerous charms aimed at curing diseases and several remedies from medicinal herbs, overall making it a key source of medical knowledge during the [[Vedic period]]. The use of herbs to treat ailments would later form a large part of [[Ayurveda]].<ref name=":1" /> 

Ayurveda, meaning the "complete knowledge for long life" is another medical system of India. Its two most famous texts (samhitas) belong to the schools of [[Charaka]] and [[Sushruta]]. The Samhitas represent later revised versions (recensions) of their original works. The earliest foundations of Ayurveda were built on a synthesis of traditional herbal practices together with a massive addition of theoretical conceptualizations, new [[nosology|nosologies]] and new therapies dating from about 600 BCE onwards, and coming out of the communities of thinkers which included the [[Buddha]] and others.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/ascetismandhealinginancientindiamedicineinthebuddhistmonasterykennethzyskg.oup_250_K/page/13/mode/1up?view=theater |title=Asceticism and Healing in Ancient India: Medicine in the Buddhist Monastery |vauthors=Zysk KG |date=1991 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-505956-4 |location=New York |pages=}}</ref><ref>Lock, Stephen etc. (200ĞďéĠĊ1). ''The Oxford Illustrated Companion to Medicine''. US: Oxford University Press. {{ISBN|0-19-262950-6}}.</ref>

According to the compendium of [[Charaka]], the [[Charaka Samhita|Charakasamhitā]], health and disease are not predetermined and life may be prolonged by human effort. The compendium of [[Sushruta|Suśruta]], the [[Sushruta Samhita|Suśrutasamhitā]] defines the purpose of medicine to cure the diseases of the sick, protect the healthy, and to prolong life. Both these ancient compendia include details of the examination, diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of numerous ailments. The [[Sushruta Samhita|Suśrutasamhitā]] is notable for describing procedures on various forms of surgery, including [[rhinoplasty]], the repair of torn ear lobes, perineal [[lithotomy]], cataract surgery, and several other excisions and other surgical procedures. Most remarkable was Susruta's surgery specially the rhinoplasty for which he is called father of plastic surgery. Susruta also described more than 125 surgical instruments in detail. Also remarkable is Sushruta's penchant for scientific classification:
His medical treatise consists of 184 chapters, 1,120 conditions are listed, including injuries and illnesses relating to aging and mental illness.{{cfn|date=July 2024}}

The Ayurvedic classics mention eight branches of medicine: kāyācikitsā ([[internal medicine]]), śalyacikitsā (surgery including [[anatomy]]), śālākyacikitsā (eye, ear, nose, and throat diseases), kaumārabhṛtya ([[pediatrics]] with [[obstetrics]] and [[gynaecology]]), bhūtavidyā (spirit and psychiatric medicine), agada tantra ([[toxicology]] with treatments of stings and bites), rasāyana (science of rejuvenation), and vājīkaraṇa ([[aphrodisiac]] and fertility). Apart from learning these, the student of Āyurveda was expected to know ten arts that were indispensable in the preparation and application of his medicines: [[distillation]], operative skills, cooking, horticulture, [[metallurgy]], sugar manufacture, [[pharmacy]], analysis and separation of minerals, compounding of metals, and preparation of [[alkalis]]. The teaching of various subjects was done during the instruction of relevant clinical subjects. For example, the teaching of anatomy was a part of the teaching of surgery, embryology was a part of training in pediatrics and obstetrics, and the knowledge of physiology and pathology was interwoven in the teaching of all the clinical disciplines.{{cfn|date=July 2024}}

Even today Ayurvedic treatment is practiced, but it is considered [[pseudoscientific]] because its premises are not based on science, some ayurvedic medicines have been found to contain toxic substances.<ref name="oxpsych">{{Cite book |title=Oxford Handbook of Psychiatry |vauthors=Semple D, Smyth R |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2019 |isbn=978-0-19-879555-1 |edition=4th |page=24 |chapter=Chapter 1: Thinking about psychiatry |doi=10.1093/med/9780198795551.003.0001 |quote=These pseudoscientific theories may&nbsp;... confuse metaphysical with empirical claims (e.g.&nbsp;... Ayurvedic medicine) |access-date=3 July 2020 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=626fDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230907105316/https://books.google.com/books?id=626fDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA24 |archive-date=7 September 2023 |url-status=live}}{{subscription required}}</ref><ref name="kaufman">{{Cite book |last=Beall |first=Jeffrey |title=Pseudoscience: The Conspiracy Against Science |publisher=MIT Press |year=2018 |isbn=978-0-262-03742-6 |editor-last=Kaufman |editor-first=Allison B. |page=293 |chapter=Scientific soundness and the problem of predatory journals |quote=Ayurveda, a traditional Indian medicine, is the subject of more than a dozen, with some of these 'scholarly' journals devoted to Ayurveda alone&nbsp;..., others to Ayurveda and some other pseudoscience.&nbsp;... Most current Ayurveda research can be classified as 'tooth fairy science,' research that accepts as its premise something not scientifically known to exist.&nbsp;... Ayurveda is a long-standing system of beliefs and traditions, but its claimed effects have not been scientifically proven. Most Ayurveda researchers might as well be studying the tooth fairy. The German publisher Wolters Kluwer bought the Indian open-access publisher Medknow in 2011....It acquired its entire fleet of journals, including those devoted to pseudoscience topics such as ''An International Quarterly Journal of Research in Ayurveda''. |author-link=Jeffrey Beall |editor-last2=Kaufman |editor-first2=James C. |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dwFKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA293 |access-date=11 September 2020 |archive-date=7 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230907105226/https://books.google.com/books?id=dwFKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA293 |url-status=live }}</ref> Both the lack of scientific soundness in the theoretical foundations of ayurveda and the quality of research have been criticized.<ref name="oxpsych" /><ref name="Sujatha2011">{{Cite journal |last=Sujatha |first=V |date=July 2011 |title=What could 'integrative' medicine mean? Social science perspectives on contemporary Ayurveda |journal=Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine |volume=2 |issue=3 |pages=115–23 |doi=10.4103/0975-9476.85549 |pmc=3193682 |pmid=22022153 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="Manohar2013">{{Cite journal |last=Manohar |first=PR |date=April 2013 |title=Uniform standards and quality control of research publications in the field of Ayurveda |journal=Ancient Science of Life |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=185–6 |doi=10.4103/0257-7941.131968 |pmc=4078466 |pmid=24991064 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="Bausell">{{Cite book |last=Bausell |first=R. Barker |url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780195313680 |title=Snake Oil Science: The Truth About Complementary and Alternative Medicine |date=2007 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |isbn=978-0-19-538342-3 |page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780195313680/page/259 259] |author-link=R. Barker Bausell |url-access=registration}}</ref>