Chennaiites turn to alternative medicines

With a number of people hit by diabetes and stress-related ailments, many Chennaiites are opting for alternative medicines like acupuncture, Ayurveda and naturopathy.As the cost of medical treatment continues to rise year after year, alternative medicine serves as another way of healing. Certain therapies are not only cheaper they are effective too.In the case of acupuncture, the Chinese way of healing is gaining momentum in the city as many patients with diabetes and asthma are flocking to these clinics. “Other therapies can only control the disease but acupuncture can treat it. We treat an array of problems ranging from autism to arthritis. The speciality of this treatment is that it has absolutely no side-effects,” said Dr Muthukumar who runs an acupuncture hospital at Nandanam.Another reason why people choose alternative medicine is that it ensures individual medical attention for each patient.“We are tired of doctors who listen to our problem for just five minutes and prescribe numerous pills without telling us what we did wrong in the first place. But alternative medicines have a personal touch,” points out Ms Divya Rathinavel, an assistant director who undergoes ayurvedic treatment to cure kidney stone. The fact that alternative medicine’s emphasis is on prevention is the main reason why it has more takers. “It believes in using the body’s own healing power to treat our illness.Naturopathy, for example, puts a lot of stress on proper diet, which consists of natural fruits and vegetables. Rather than tell you about your illness, naturopathy will tell you about how to establish health,” says Ms Vani Prakash, a city-based nature cure therapist. In short, naturopathy is about a modified diet rather than pills, she added.

Source:Deccan Chronicle