ABSTRACT
The integrative approach for wellness has become an arena where integrating the indigenous practice with the dominant bio-medical system has activated a transformation process.Further, a debate characterized by fundamental dichotomies of health/wellness is there to find an approach in agreement with holistic wellness. The limitations of protocol-driven medical science and avoiding the patient behind the patient have again compelled us during this pandemic to explore holistic health. This paper presents an analysis and explores the feasibility of Ayurveda as an integrative system to wellness and tests the Ayurveda concept of holistic wellness against three such dichotomies: 'health' vs wellness, 'body' vs 'mind,' and 'curative vs. preventive,' where the current medical model can be said to represent the first elements in the three dichotomies. Keeping the current Covid-19 pandemic as a critical incident, researchers tried to justify that the synergistic confluence will act as a complementary/supportive knowledge in humanity's struggle against the pandemic. For synergistic confluence of Ayurveda and medical Science, the scientist's temperament and evidence-based medical science approach should be applied to validate the principles and therapies of Ayurveda.
ABSTRACT
Aims & Objectives: To establish correlation between subtle changes in peripheral blood smear (PBS) as an aid to complement diagnosis of SARS-COVID 19. Patients/Materials & Methods: Approximately over 300 PBS were studied from COVID suspected cases in a private hospital. Inclusion criteria was to take all samples from the fever clinic presenting with symptoms of COVID, also samples from known COVID contacts were considered. Detailed microscopic analysis of PBS of the selected slides during the hospital course was done. Results: Significant numbers of slides showed characteristic changes in all cell lines, more so in WBCs. Before even when the well documented lymphopenia, high N/L ratio, the leucocytes exhibit peculiar morphological alterations which were never observed in any other disease. The neutrophils show coarse granulations, nuclear detachment, C-shaped or fetus like nuclei, abberant nuclear projection, elongated nucleoplasm, irregular cytoplasmic projections, cytoplasmic vacuolation, cytoplasmic blebs. The lymphocytes showed condensed chromatin, abundant light pale blue cytoplasm scalloping other adjacent cells, cytoplasmic pod formation. Monocytes showed prominent cytoplasmic vacuoles and nuclear dyspoiesis. Additionally these slides were kept separate to keep a tab on the RT-PCR report which followed after 48-72 h. Also other blood parameters like S.CRP, S.LDH, S.Ferritin, D-Dimer levels of these patients were noted. It was assuring to see how well the morphological changes in PBS correlated with the blood parameters, the HRCT and later confirmed by RT PCR. Discussion & Conclusion: A detailed and vigilant microscopic observation of a simple slide can provide a sea of information of the ongoing pathology. In a pandemic like this wherein in remote underresourced places where RT-PCR is out sourced or takes a longer turnaround-time, initiation of treatment merely based on symptoms can be challenging for the physicians. Thus the peculiar PBS findings can be exploited to help in diagnosis and to initiate earlier hospitalization and treatment for better outcome. Disclaimer: No conflict of interest. This is a pilot study based on subjective observations of morphological features in PBF. More information and studies on a larger group are needed to establish the correlation.