Role of Homoeopathy in Kerala’s Public Health: A Cross-Sectional Survey

Dr Sreelakshmi P

ABSTRACT
A cross-sectional study design with a questionnaire is given to the population of Kerala to understand their opinion about the role of homoeopathy in Kerala’s public health. Data is collected and analyzed. A literature review was carried out of recent surveys and articles to assess the utilization of homoeopathic health services in Kerala and awareness of homoeopathy among the general population of Kerala. Extensive attempts were made to identify and access all data sources that could contribute to understanding the situation of homeopathy in public health in Kerala. These efforts included analysis of secondary data about government wellness centers.

RESULTS:
In Kerala, modern medicine and AYUSH systems are crucial in providing universal access and availability to the poorer sections of society. Kerala has made significant gains in health indices such as high life expectancy, low infant mortality rate, birth rate, and death rate, etc. Homoeopathy is well-represented in public health.

Out of 113 respondents, 97% have knowledge about homoeopathy system and 92.92% have taken homoeopathy treatment for various diseases. The reason for using Homoeopathy was that they believed it had no side effects. And the reason for not using homoeopathy was said to be the long duration taken to have cure.

CONCLUSION
General population have knowledge about Homoeopathy, but certain misconceptions were also present. And also use of Homoeopathy is restricted to only common ailments, mostly due to lack of  awareness about special clinics , OPD services and usefulness in wide range of diseases and disorders. We observe that more awareness programs should be conducted.

INTRODUCTION
This dissertation explores the role of homoeopathy in the public health scenario of Kerala and awareness and utilization of Homoeopathic services among the population of Kerala. This study aims at creating more awareness about homoeopathy services

Homoeopathy- the new therapeutic science found by German physician Dr. Samuel Hahnemann in the year 1796 is the second most popular healing art and the first one among the alternative systems of therapeutics. The credit of introducing Homoeopathy in Kerala rests with the Christian missionary in the beginning of 20th century. Homoeopathy was included in the Medical Practitioners bill of 1943 and after the formation of Kerala state by uniting Travancore and Cochin, a Medical Practitioners Act was legislated and equal importance was given to Homoeopathy with other systems of Therapeutics. During the period of Sri EMS Namboothirippad as Chief minister in the year 1958 Dr AR Menon, the Health minister took earnest efforts to start Government Homoeopathic Dispensaries and the first one was started at Thiruvananthapuram in the year 1958 and at the same year at Kottayam Kurichy, The Athurasramam Homoeo medical college was started functioning by framing a four and a half year Diploma course .First Homoeopathic Medical college by the Government was started at Calicut in the year 1975 with the Degree Course of five and a half year duration which was the first of its kind in Asia .Government Homoeopathic medical college at Thiruvananthapuram was started in the year 1983.The Kerala Government as its policy of starting Government Homoeo Dispensaries at all panchayats like other systems which came in to existence in the year 1968. The Directorate of Homoeopathy came in to existence in 1973 with the purpose of propagating Homoeopathy, Proper care for public service including preventive measures.

Currently, in Kerala there are

• 709 Regular dispensaries.
• 407 NHM dispensaries.
• 29 Temporary dispensaries in scheduled caste dominant areas in the State.
• 3 Floating dispensaries., 4 Mobile dispensaries.
• 5 Homoeopathic Medical Colleges

Ongoing projects under homoeopathic department are :RAECH, Ayushmanbhava, Punarjani, Seethalayam, Sadgamaya, Janani and Chethana.

There are Proposed Projects :Projects for Trans genders, Projects for Liver Disorders

Special OPs on specific disease conditions such as diabetes, thyroid, asthma, allergy etc. are currently conducted in District Hospitals on specific days by deploying medical officers from the peripheral dispensaries.

ESI :12 full time and one part-time ESI homeopathy dispensaries are also functioning in different parts of Kerala.

AIM AND OBJECTIVE
To analyze the utilization of Homoeopathic health services and awareness about Homoeopathy among the general population of Kerala.

To create awareness about Homoeopathy and services provided.

HEALTH CARE SYSTEM OF KERALA
Kerala’s healthcare system is renowned for its exceptional quality and accessibility. With a strong network of public and private institutions, the state boasts impressive health indicators, often comparable to developed countries. Kerala’s healthcare model emphasizes preventive care, universal access, and community participation. The state’s high literacy rates, robust primary healthcare system, and efficient implementation of national health programs contribute to its remarkable achievements, including:

• High life expectancy
• Low infant mortality rate
• High vaccination coverage
• Effective management of infectious diseases like malaria, TB, and HIV/AIDS
• Strong Ayurveda and traditional medicine integration

Kerala’s unique “Aardram” initiative provides comprehensive primary care, while initiatives like “Kerala Health Mission” focus on quality improvement and infrastructure development. The state’s healthcare success story serves as a model for other Indian states and developing countries worldwide.

Kerala’s healthcare system has made significant progress, with universal access to modern medicine and AYUSH systems. The state government has taken several steps to improve healthcare, including:

MATERIALS AND METHODS

STUDY DESIGN
A cross sectional study design is to be used and self administered questionnaire with close ended questions was given among population of Kerala and data collected and analysed.

STUDY LOCATION : Kerala

DURATION OF STUDY: Approximately one year

SAMPLE SIZE : Minimum 100

SELECTION CRITERIA

• People who are natives of Kerala
• All people whose consent is available

Inclusion criteria

• People above the age of 15 years

Exclusion criteria

• People below 15 years of age
• People with no consent letter

DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURE
Self administered questionnaire with close ended questions in Malayalam google form

DISCUSSION
In the present study we surveyed the knowledge and utilization of homoeopathic health services among the general population of Kerala. Particularly about Diseases for which homoeopathy medicines has been used, knowledge about the preventive aspect of homoeopathy, special projects under Homoeopathy department, reasons for using and not using Homoeopathy treatment.

There were total of 113 participants in our study.

In the study 53.1%belong to 15-25 age group, 20.4% belong to 26-35 , 10.6% to 36-45 age group, 15.9% respondents above 45 years. Among the study 69% of the participants are females and 31% male.

Out of 14 districts, there were participants from 10 districts. Highest number of respondents are from Thrissur followed by Malappuram and Kozhikode.

Among 113 participants 110 know about Homoeopathy and 3 participants say they don’t know about Homoeopathy. 26,5% have information about Homoeopathy from friends , 30.9%from relatives , 18.58% from social media and 23.89% participants have information from other sources.

On analyzing the data respiratory complaints including common cold and asthma come the first place for which homoeopathy has been used. Next comes menstrual complaints, chickenpox, migraine. Among the study population only 36% use Homoeopathy as their first line of treatment.

In this study Childhood diseases with 44,27% comes in first place among the diseases where homoeopathy is effective . Next comes skin diseases with 19.08% of respondents followed by adolescent problems and female complaints.

On asking the reasons for finding Homoeopathy effective 52.27% says it has no side effects and 22.72% consider it because of low cost and 21.21% because of sweetness

52.20% are taking treatment from private homoeopathy practitioners and 46% opt Government hospitals and dispensaries. Only small percentage of 1.7 use self medication. And only 81.41% of participants know Homoeopathy dispensaries and hospitals in their locality.18.58% don’t know any Homoeopathy hospitals and dispensaries near their locality.

63.71% of the participants are aware of the preventive use of Homoeopathic medicines in epidemic diseases. Majority are aware of preventive for covid 19 and chickenpox.

Significant majority of the participants responded with don’t know on asking about the projects under Homoeopathy department indicating that they are unaware of the projects. Ayushmanbhava and Punarjani received the highest number of responses among the known projects. While Sadgamaya and RAECH received the least recognition

In the study reason for not using Homoeopathy treatment was said as it take more time for cure of disease.

In our study on asking suggestions and opinions about Homoeopathy in public health sector majority have suggested to create and provide more awareness about Homoeopathy services and dispensaries to common people at government level. They have also said about the difficulty in accessing medicines. And suggested more pharmacy facilities and ensure medicine availability among common people

Another major area where Homoeopathy is effective is prevention in epidemic diseases. But people are not fully aware of the preventive aspect of  Homoeopathy. In the recent covid -19 outbreak majority of the population have used our preventive ‘Arsenicum album’.

According to our study results and the studies compared to it we can conclude that more awareness programmes and surveys should be conducted to bring in notice about the various new projects and services about homoeopathy. It is also observed that despite the knowledge and beliefs about Homoeopathy attitude towards its use in case of illness is different.  

CONCLUSION
This study among the general population of Kerala concluded that general population have knowledge about Homoeopathy, but certain misconceptions were also present. And also use of Homoeopathy is restricted to only common ailments mostly due to lack to awareness about special clinics and Opd services. And usefulness in wide range of diseases and disorders.

As the survey is conducted on small population it is very difficult to explore about the general awareness and utilization of Homoeopathy. From this survey we observe that people should be educated about the usage of homoeopathic medicines as preventive medicine in various diseases and also about special projects and services available in the panchayat dispensaries and district hospitals. More awareness programs should be conducted.

LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

• The study was conducted over a short duration of time and data was mainly collected using Google form, data should have been collected directly through in person surveys.
• Many generalizations had been done in respect to the morbid conditions for which homoeopathic medicines had been taken; more specific conditions such as osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis in place of geriatric complaints should have been included in the survey.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH
Data collection have to be coordinated with the help of District Medical officers and more data should be collected including maximum people from all districts of Kerala.

REFERENCES

• Homoeopathy-Government of Kerala http://homoeopathy.kerala.gov.in/en/home
• History of Homoeopathy in Kerala http://www.homeobook.com
• Samuel Hahnemann Homoeopathy, Organon, Materia Medica http://www.britannica.com
• National Homoeopathy Research Institute in Mental Health (NHRIMH) http://nhrihm.ac.in about Homoeopathy
• Social Services Medical and Public Health- Kerala State Planning Board http://spb.kerala.gov.in
• INTERNATIONAL AYUSH CONCLAVE KERALA FEB 15-19, 2019
• Ayush public health interventions by local self government institutions Kerala(O S Ghosh , Nandan P, Leena Rani, Muhammed Thareekh Bin Basheer)
• Homoeopathy project ‘Jyothirgamaya – Balya ‘ bagged best public health project – Homeobook- http://www.homoebook.com
• Homoeopathy as Prophylaxis in Epidemics and Endemics -A Review (Dr. Devendra Kumar , Dr. Pranesh Kumar Singh)
• A review on the role of Homoeopathy in epidemics with some reflections on Covid -19 (Anupriya Chaudhary, Anil Khurana) http://www.irh.org
• Utilization of indigenous system of medicine and homoeopathy in India ( Padam Singh, R J Yadav, Arvind Pandey)
• A study on public awareness and perception towards homoepathy medicine in India (Yoganandan , Vetriselvan V V)
• Role of homoeopathy in Covid-19 management -A clinical experience (Niraj Parikh, Devang P Parikh)
• Homoeopathy : a preventive approach to medicine (Marcus zulian Teixeira)
• A study on acceptability of Indian system of Medicine and Homoeopathy in India. Results from the state of West Bengal. (Yadav, Pandey, P Singh)
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• Health care seeking attitude and utilization of Traditional medicine in India – an overview (N Srikanth, Sulochana , Arjun Singh, Renu Singh)- world journal of pharmaceutical research vol 4 , issue 7,2015
• Homoeopathic Genus Epidemicus ‘Bryonia alba’ as a prophylactic during an outbreak of chikungunya in India. A cluster randomized double blind placebo- controlled trial. (K R Janardanan, S Gopinathan, T N Sreedhara Kurup, Bonthu Sundara Jaya Raja Kumar, Abha Aggarwal, Roja Varanasi, Debadatta Nayak, Maya Padmanabhan, Praveen Oberai ,Hari Singh, Vijay Pratap Singh, Chaturbhuja Nayak) http://www.ijrh.org
  Central council for reaearch in Homoeopathy Epidemics- IMR project
• A survey regarding awareness and beliefs aboit homoeopathy among general population during Magh Mela at Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh ,India (Manas Ranjan Sarangi, Abhishek Pramanik, Jaya Gupta,Ramesh Prasad, Pramodji Singh, Mahesh Shah, Alok kumar Upadhyay , Saurabh Jain, Ambreesh Pandey, Arvind Kumar, Goutam Rakshit, Anil Khurana, Raj K Manchanda) CCRH New Delhi
• Homoeopathy in public health in India (Harkeen Kaur, Deepti Singh Chalia, Raj K Manchanda) CCRH New Delhi 2019

Dr Sreelakshmi P
Internee, Govt Homoeopathic Medical College, Calicut
UGO Dr Mansoor Ali KR Prof & HOD Department of HRC
Email : sree22031999@gmail.com
Ph : 8592853951

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