Reliability studies of diagnostic methods in Indian traditional Ayurveda medicine: An overview
Authors
Vrinda Kurande
Clinical Science, Department of Health Science and Technology, Aalborg University, Denmark
Rasmus Waagepetersen
Department of Mathematical Sciences, Aalborg University, Denmark
Egon Toft
Department of Health Science and Technology, Aalborg University, Denmark
Ramjee Prasad
Center for TeleInFrastructure, Aalborg University, Denmark
Keywords:
Ayurveda, diagnostic methods, kappa statistics, reliability, traditional medicine
Abstract
Recently, a need to develop supportive new scientific evidence for contemporary Ayurveda has emerged. One of the research objectives is an assessment of the reliability of diagnoses and treatment. Reliability is a quantitative measure of consistency. It is a crucial issue in classification (such as prakriti classification), method development (pulse diagnosis), quality assurance for diagnosis and treatment and in the conduct of clinical studies. Several reliability studies are conducted in western medicine. The investigation of the reliability of traditional Chinese, Japanese and Sasang medicine diagnoses is in the formative stage. However, reliability studies in Ayurveda are in the preliminary stage. In this paper, examples are provided to illustrate relevant concepts of reliability studies of diagnostic methods and their implication in practice, education, and training. An introduction to reliability estimates and different study designs and statistical analysis is given for future studies in Ayurveda.
Keywords: Ayurveda, diagnostic methods, kappa statistics, reliability, traditional medicine
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