HOME
Vol VII, Issue 1
Date of Publication: January 10, 2022
DOI: https://doi.org/10.20529/IJME.2022.002
Views
, PDF Downloads:
THEME EDITORIAL
Listening to diverse knowledge systems
Abstract:
To some, the idea of health that is not beholden to strict notions of biomedical science is already misbegotten. This editorial cannot address this audience, for it believes that it is worth listening to varied knowledge systems. There is now an increased acceptance that the alienation felt by many towards contemporary health practice needs to be taken seriously. This issue contains six articles on the theme of diverse/traditional medical systems, and the need for a nuanced response to the questions they raise with regard to mainstream health practices. One accepts that these diverse/traditional medical systems may be misused, or insufficiently understood; the articles in this issue by Hurford, Rana, and Sachan (1), as well as by Ransing, Kar and Menon make this amply clear (2).
Copyright and license ©Indian Journal of Medical Ethics 2022: Open Access and Distributed under the Creative Commons license ( CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which permits only non-commercial and non-modified sharing in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
Leave a Reply
Comments:
This interesting editorial makes some questionable assertions and begs some questions.
For example, what is an “Indian knowledge system”? How does it differ from the knowledge available in the world, now, more freely than at any other time in human history? How does one go about acquiring it? Why should it not be integrated into the knowledge now considered the universal possession of humankind?
One may also ask if it is true that modern medicine (the author calls it Euro-American, but that can easily be contested) really has delinked disease from an ethical and emotional context? Certainly, I was taught that one must always keep in mind the social context of disease and the emotional suffering of the patient.
If the practitioner of modern medicine is unable to do much about the social context of disease because it requires political action, and if emotional suffering is inadequately addressed, it has perhaps more to do with the conditions in which the healing experience (of which medicine is a part) is practiced, rather than any lack of knowledge in modern medicine about the significant part played by the social and emotional aspects of living on health and disease.
For too long have we heard this cliche bandied about – that so-called indigenous healers are “holistic” whereas, in modern medicine, to quote the author “one is ill, and so takes a pill.” No data is ever presented to back up this ludicrous claim.