Utilization of AYUSH in public health care system: a review

ABSTRACT

India is currently facing shortage of trained health workforce, especially in rural areas. WHO recommends mainstreaming of Complementary & Traditional systems of medicine as an affordable & culturally acceptable way towards achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC). Despite the Government of India operating AYUSH clinics in PHCs for more than 10 years, we know very little about patients attending these clinics. Exploring the reasons for utilization of AYUSH care is of much value for planning to scale up the integration of AYUSH. The required information on utilization of AYUSH services were obtained through a review of the literature in PubMed databases (including MEDLINE) using the medical subject headings (MeSH) terms ‘AYUSH’, ‘utilization’, ‘Ayurveda’, ‘Siddha’, ‘Homeopathy’, ‘morbidities’. All such studies which have focussed on profiling of patients who sought care in AYUSH were the individuals who have non–life-threatening chronic diseases or conditions. To improve AYUSH based health care services, it is imperative to understand the acceptability of AYUSH interventions among the general public for the utmost utilization of AYUSH services.