Indian Medical Tourism Incomplete without Yoga Department in every Hospital

Recently in one of the interaction the Indian Tourism Minister Dr Mahesh Sharma said that India is going to be the hub of medical tourism because of its hospitality and culture.

It is correct but for that a slight paradigm shift is required in the way we practice medicine in the country.

Most western patients come to India to take advantage of Yoga and Ayurveda in addition to the western medicine.

Only for a lower cost we cannot attract medical tourists for long as sooner or later the China will over power us in future for medical treatments.

Our Prime Minister has convinced the world to have an international Yoga day. But unfortunately we do not have a yoga department in every government or a private medical institution.

Let India be the first country to have a yoga and an Ayurveda department in every hospital in addition to the western medicine.

The time is to promote traditional Yoga and Ayurveda. Unfortunately as they are not getting an uplifment they are ending up in cross pathy which is not on the interest of both their profession as well as the community.

Recently a review of studies examining the benefits of yoga suggests that Yoga practice provides significant benefits on cardiovascular risk factors, including LDL cholesterol and systolic blood pressure.

Those who practiced asana-based yoga reduced their LDL-cholesterol levels by 12.1 mg/dL and systolic blood pressure by 5.2 mm Hg and increased their HDL-cholesterol levels by 3.2 mg/dL.

In addition, the yoga practitioners also saw significant reductions in body-mass index, diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, triglycerides, and heart rate. Overall, the yogis lost 2.35 kg compared with non exercisers.

Individuals who cannot or prefer not to perform traditional aerobic exercise might still achieve similar benefits in cardiovascular-disease risk reduction by Yoga.

The review, which is published December 15, 2014 in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology, included 32 randomized, controlled trials involving 2768 participants.

[The author Dr K K Aggarwal is Senior National Vice President Indian Medical Association and President Heart Care Foundation of India]