Ayurvedic Perspective on Food as Medicine - A Comprehensive Review

Abstract

Main key for good health is wholesome food and obedience of different dietary regimen without which nothing can be obtained. Generally people have this problem that after suffering from disease, they are unable to choose proper food according to the disease and also being ignorant about the diet according to the disease, due to which that particular person's disease becomes fiercer. Therefore, food according to disease is of great importance which helps for the destruction of disease. Before knowing this food, it is also very important to know the factors of disease. It is clearly described in the codes that improper food is the root cause of diseases and along with it, the nature of the particular person, condition of vitiate doshas in his body, Agni, Kala, Desha, etc. also play an important and helpful role in this process. If seen in this way, food is also a cause of diseases and it is also an infallible medicine for disease prevention. In different Ayurvedic texts and lexicons, what type of food should be taken daily in the codes, the benefits of proper food, how to choose specific dietary articles in various diseases like Prameha, Sthaulya, Arsha etc. and how this food will cure the disease in the form of medicine is mentioned in detail. In this article this all matter will be described in detail.