M. Bhaskar Rao

By M. Bhaskar Rao - Jul 15, 2011

There is a growing general consensus that ancient India had its own fairly developed system of science, mathematics, medicine and even surgery. Still, most textbooks, when they describe the evolutionary history of medicine depict everything other than the modern allopathic system as primitive early explorations. This condescending attitude has done much harm to modern medicine, since it neither tries to understand nor utilise the wide experience and intuitive knowledge of those who have gone before us. This article however throws a fresh insight and compares an ancient surgical technique for treating ano-rectal fistula with present-day surgical options. It is a difficult task and yet the author does it well. It is almost as if Suśruta were present in our own time discussing his methods in a modern medical forum!