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trc-phc

trc-phc

TRANS-DISCIPLINARY RESEARCH CLUSTER, JNU
 
Pluralist Health Care: Knowledge, Technology, Practices and Policy
 
Increasingly, health care is becoming pluralistic throughout the world with the wide variety of ailments and conditions requiring expert attention. The list of health problems requiring expert attention is growing bigger and bigger with the addition of life style ailments, recovery from accidents and trauma, iatrogenic problems, mental ailments and adjustment problems to the existing burden of acute, genetic and infectious diseases. Improvements in life expectancy, has brought aging related problems on board alongside pressing problems of child health and nutrition.   No one medical system is adequate to handle these problems and populations habitually resort to various remedies and approach a number of experts. Different knowledges and practices are found in the public domain with governments promoting a whole range of medicines and wellbeing practices under its health care delivery mechanism. In short, pluralist health care has become a global phenomenon. The private sector is already booming with health services of diverse nature, both regulated and unregulated. A lot of cross practice is found with professionals trained in one system adopting some practices from others and has created a vast area of medical practice with blurred borders.
 
India is endowed with rich biodiversity and is also the hub of medical pluralism; a wealth of knowledge on the medical uses of plants and minerals is scattered. India is also a global leader in the manufacture of generic biomedical drugs with a significant infrastructure for pharmaceutical development. What are the institutions in India where plural medical practices co-exist? What kinds of interaction are found between systems of medicine and medical practices? How effective are these interactions for the medical and health practices involved? What kind of policies and models of medical pluralism are adopted by countries of the world? Which legal frameworks and approaches will be relevant, meaningful and effective for the Indian situation? 
 
Herbs have become important commodities under medical pluralism and India as a region with high scale of biodiversity is at the cross roads. What kind of protocols and influences are found in the development of new ‘herbaceuticals’? What are biomarkers used in integrated drug development and how are they developed? There are numerous individual studies on pluralistic health practices, but missing is a broader classificatory framework within which they could be placed and critically examined in their multiple dimensions.  Mainstreaming of AYUSH systems of medicine in the public and private health care delivery institutions has also given rise to important issues of integration of medical systems and mass production of traditional drugs.
 
This Trans-disciplinary Research Cluster on ‘Pluralist Health Care’ is a platform to engage with the eight officially recognized systems of health knowledge in India--Allopathy, Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, Sowa Rigpa, Homeopathy, Yoga and Naturopathy-- along with the folk practices and practitioners found in all regions of the country. It proposes to bring together global experience on developing pluralist systems and work towards developing theoretical, technological and systemic approaches to pluralist medicine as relevant to the present Indian context. 
 
Accordingly, the TRC on Pluralist Health Care is committed to the following objectives:
 
  1. To develop a trans-disciplinary matrix to organize plural and integrative health practices and research at various institutional levels in terms of their biological, clinical, social, organizational and policy aspects.
  2. To document published research work on this theme.
  3. To develop complete case studies of selected diseases, drugs/substances, procedures, institutions, methods of validation and verification, emergent innovations where integrative or plural approach to health care is found
  4. To collate information on state mechanisms for regulating medical practices and promoting robust medical pluralism in India and from different countries. To develop a classificatory system of models of medical integration
  5. To work towards developing legal instruments to protect medicinal plants and traditional health related knowledge in the public domain
 
These are challenging tasks demanding expertise across disciplines - life sciences, medicine, law and the social sciences.
 
This TRC has, therefore, been instituted by a group of nine faculty members from three different schools and six Centres of JNU— Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health, Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Centre for the Study of Science Policy (all in the School of Social Sciences), Special Centre for Law and Governance, the School of Computational and Integrative Sciences, and the School of Environmental Sciences. We hope to involve colleagues within the university from other Centres/Schools as well, and to develop collaborations with researchers/institutions outside JNU, especially those engaged in practice and research related to the various systems of medicine and health knowledge.
 
Members and Publications

 

Co-ordinator:
Dr. Saradindu Bhaduri,
Centre for Studies in Science Policy,
School of Social Sciences

 

Webpage: https://jnu.ac.in/Faculty/saradindu/cv.pdf

 

Related Publications:

 
Co-coordinators:
Prof. Ritu Priya, CSMCH/SSS        
            
Webpage: https://www.jnu.ac.in/content/ritupriya

 

Related Publications:
 
Prof. Indira Ghosh, (Retd), SCIS

 

Webpage: http://ccbb.jnu.ac.in/ig-web/in_home.html

 

Relevant Publications:
 
Prof. R.N.K. Bamezai, (Retd), SLS

 

Webpage:

 

Relevant Publications:
 
Dr. Aditi Saran, SC&SS

 

Webpage: https://www.jnu.ac.in/content/aditisharan

 

Related Publications:
 
Prof. V Sujatha, CSSS/SSS

 

Webpage: https://jnu.ac.in/content/sujathav

 

Related Publications:
 
Dr. Sunita Reddy, CSMCH/SSS

 

Webpage:https://jnu.ac.in/Faculty/sunitareddy/cv.pdf

 

Related Publications:
 
Dr. Prachin Ghodajkar, CSMCH /SSS

 

Webpage:https://www.jnu.ac.in/content/prachinjnu

 

Related Publications:
 
Dr. Nupur Chowdhury, CSLG

 

Webpage: https://jnu.ac.in/Faculty/nupur/index.html

 

Related Publications:

A warm welcome to the modified and updated website of the Centre for East Asian Studies. The East Asian region has been at the forefront of several path-breaking changes since 1970s beginning with the redefining the development architecture with its State-led development model besides emerging as a major region in the global politics and a key hub of the sophisticated technologies. The Centre is one of the thirteen Centres of the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi that provides a holistic understanding of the region.

Initially, established as a Centre for Chinese and Japanese Studies, it subsequently grew to include Korean Studies as well. At present there are eight faculty members in the Centre. Several distinguished faculty who have now retired include the late Prof. Gargi Dutt, Prof. P.A.N. Murthy, Prof. G.P. Deshpande, Dr. Nranarayan Das, Prof. R.R. Krishnan and Prof. K.V. Kesavan. Besides, Dr. Madhu Bhalla served at the Centre in Chinese Studies Programme during 1994-2006. In addition, Ms. Kamlesh Jain and Dr. M. M. Kunju served the Centre as the Documentation Officers in Chinese and Japanese Studies respectively.

The academic curriculum covers both modern and contemporary facets of East Asia as each scholar specializes in an area of his/her interest in the region. The integrated course involves two semesters of classes at the M. Phil programme and a dissertation for the M. Phil and a thesis for Ph. D programme respectively. The central objective is to impart an interdisciplinary knowledge and understanding of history, foreign policy, government and politics, society and culture and political economy of the respective areas. Students can explore new and emerging themes such as East Asian regionalism, the evolving East Asian Community, the rise of China, resurgence of Japan and the prospects for reunification of the Korean peninsula. Additionally, the Centre lays great emphasis on the building of language skills. The background of scholars includes mostly from the social science disciplines; History, Political Science, Economics, Sociology, International Relations and language.

Several students of the centre have been recipients of prestigious research fellowships awarded by Japan Foundation, Mombusho (Ministry of Education, Government of Japan), Saburo Okita Memorial Fellowship, Nippon Foundation, Korea Foundation, Nehru Memorial Fellowship, and Fellowship from the Chinese and Taiwanese Governments. Besides, students from Japan receive fellowship from the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.