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Research by Region
Tibet
A brief history of Tibetan Medicine
Concluding Remarks
One of the unique features of the Tibetan medical tradition in comparison with Western, Chinese and Ayurvedic medical traditions, is the premise that "mental" factors are accepted as causes of diseases (Jäger 1999: 22). To a large extent it is this combination of Buddhist philosophy with humoural medicine that has made Tibetan medicine attractive to the West. Unfortunately, it has also led to its exploitation and criminalisation in the context of 'medical facts' versus 'magical beliefs' (Adams 2002b:1). But it has also helped many Western patients to find meaning in their illness and offered alternative treatment methods that attend to both, body and mind.
The current discrepancies between the theory of the respected Gyushi and the more pragmatic medical practices in Tibetan clinics in Northern India, reflect the medical pluralism that Tibetan doctors face in their daily practice; by now sphygmomanometers are more often employed than the traditional urine analysis (Samuel 2001: 261). This exposes the contemporary tension between traditional ethical medical values and modern pragmatic clinical situations. Future studies will need to focus further on how medical and religious disciplinary boundaries have been drawn in Tibet, both historically and in contemporary pluralistic Tibetan societies and how they play out on a modern global stage involving a Western clientele and contemporary Amchis. Such studies will help to understand how much of the tradition is being lost, transformed, re-discovered, neglected or changed over time.
Text supplied by Barbara Gerke
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