A History of Indian Medical Literature v3.c46.82

v3.c46.82

The importance of the science of the pulse is highlighted (10–12). Three diagnostic methods are mentioned: touching (sparśana), questioning (praśna) and examining (darśana) a patient (13–14).¹⁶ Touching, i.e., feeling the pulse at the wrist (hastamūla), ankle (pādamūla), or both wrist and ankle, enables a physician to diagnose fever, disorders of the doṣas, the state of the digestive fire, ailments caused by fasting and waking at night, an intensive activity of the digestive fire (atyagni), deficiency of the semen (hīnavīryatva), disorders arising from fear (bhaya), grief (śoka) and confusion (bhrama), ailments arising from food of a particular taste, ¹⁷ painful conditions brought about by (an excess of) physical exercise and sexual activity, and disorders of digestion (ajīrṇa). Questioning reveals the presence of kukṣiśūla, udāvarta, pārśvaśūla, bhagandara, sandhivāta, haemorrhoids (arśāṃsi), the twenty urinary disorders (mūtraroga), skhaladvīrya, ¹⁸ śiroroga, poisoning (viṣaseva), antrīhṛṣṭi, ¹⁹ hastapādadāidha, ²⁰ diseases of the penis, bladder and anus, and bleeding from the female genital organs (raktasrāva bhagotthita) (19cd–22ab). Examination discloses the presence of kāsa, śvāsa, eye diseases, pīṭakāḥ, vraṇa, aṇḍavāta, śopha, pāṇḍu(roga), kāmila, pīnasa, asthibhāṅga, ūrubhaṅga, nādībheda, ²¹ galagraha, karṇārbuda, mūrchā, arśāṃsi (haemorrhoids), plīhan, ānāha, udara, sakthīśopha (swelling of the thighs or legs), galagranthi, upajihvā, masūrikā, the eighteen forms of kuṣṭha, ḍamaru, ²² and gaṇḍamālikā (22cd–25).