PA02.08. Role of herbs in psychosomatic disorders

PURPOSE: Stress is taking toll of the health of the people in this present competitive and challenging world. Ayurvedic acharayas have realized the role of mind on the body thousands of years ago. While mentioning the etiology of almost every disease our acharyas have mentioned the psychological factors like bhaya, shoka, kroda etc along with the physiological causes. It shows the effect of mind in causation of a disease. These psychological factors like bhaya, shoka etc when become excessive and uncontrollable they lead to manasika rogas. These manasika rogas are called as psychosomatic disorders. In Ayurveda a number of herbs have been mentioned as medhya rasayanas. The herbs like brahmi, mandookaparni, shankapuspi, aswagandha, yestimadhu, guduchi etc, have been mentioned at various contexts which work in different ways to help restore the health in psychosomatic disorders. Hence the present topic the “ROLE OF HERBS IN PSYCHOSOMATIC DISORDERS” was taken up to study the mode of action of herbs mentioned in manasika rogas. METHOD: The drugs mentioned by the brihatrayees under the treatment of manasika rogas like unmada and apasmara are enumerated and later the properties of most frequently mentioned herbs are studied. RESULT: The herbs like Brahmi, Shankapuspi act by their nootropic activity and the herbs like Lashuna, Vaca etc act by their high antioxidant property. CONCLUSION: The drugs by our acharyas act by their rasa, guna virya and vipaka help in the elimination of aggravated dosas their by helps the body to regain the homeostasis of tridoshas.