Mumbai is a cosmopolitan city having all types of patients rich, middle class and poor belonging to different casts and creed including people from outside India. However, there are big hospitals mostly private beyond the reach of lower middle class and poor. Municipal hospitals which were absolutely free several years ago have started charging even from the outdoor patients. Under the circumstances, poor is nowhere to go even for treatment of ordinary illness not to speak of bypass and various cardiac procedures including kidney and other transplant surgery.

Private General Practice and Alternative Medicine
The usual outlet for poor and middle class patients are the private general practitioners. Again, there is class division, qualified in recognized discipline e.g. Allopathy, Ayurveda, Unani, Homoeopathy etc and quacks most of them are not even educated. But there is another discipline collectively called alternative system (which also include Ayurveda, Homoeopathy etc.) flourishing not only because they are less expensive but more and more people prefer these therapies because of increasing realization of adverse drug reactions.

In advanced countries like UK, USA etc. qualified practitioners are also taking up alternative system in large numbers and recognized alternative medicine practitioners are being trained to handle basic allopathic drugs so that patients particularly in rural areas can get benefit of their choice available sometime at the door with reasonable cost towards fulfillment of Alma-Ata declaration “health for all”.

Currently, 40% of general practitioners in UK offer access to complimentary (conventional and alternative) medicine. Courses of complimentary medicines are also being offered to medical school students in UK and USA. A large number of medical schools have effective classes and seminars in complimentary medicine. Based on above background. I shall look forward for private practice in integrated geriatric medicine. Since geriatricians are few and far between and many senior citizens are inclined to be treated by alternative therapies, it will be worthwhile to integrate modern medicine with alternative therapies for the maximum benefit of senior citizens.

Integrated Geriatric Medicine
Presently alternative therapies like Ayurveda, Homoeopathy and Unani are recognized disciplines in India and non drug therapy e.g. Naturopathy, Yoga and Meditation are increasingly used as preventive. However, need of the hour is training of personnel in integrated medicine who can practice simultaneously in both modern (preferably geriatric) and one or more of the recognized alternative therapies. A seminar on “Integrated Geriatric Medicine” was held recently in Bombay Hospital (S.P. Jain Auditorium) on 14th May 2005 with attendance of more than 80 people1 having extensive coverage of press and subsequent inquiry from many individuals whether anybody was practicing in integrated geriatric medicine in Mumbai.

Geriatric Medicine and Quantum Healing
Still recently, idea of quantum mechanical healings2 has been introduced claiming cure of number of incurable cancer patients3 and will be an ideal approach with geriatric medicine.

Quantum healing is based on Ayurvedic concept : basic fabric of nature lies at the quantum level (quantum is photon many million times smaller than the smallest unit of atom). At quantum level your body is sending all kinds of signals waiting for you to pick them up and the human awareness is capable of sensing these faint vibrations. By treating underlying quantum mechanical body itself, Ayurveda can bring about changes far beyond itself, Ayurveda can be brought about through meditation, primordial sound and bliss.3 Bliss is that silence just as intelligence is, you cannot feel that you are intelligent but you can feel bliss through meditation.

Ancient doctors were also great sages who believed human body is created out of consciousness. Protons and neutrons do not grow older nor does electricity (Photon). Life which consists of these fundamental practice is astonishingly durable. Our DNA has remained much the same for at least 600 million years. Ayurveda says the same is true for human body, it first takes form as intense but invisible vibrations called Quantum fluctuations before it proceeds to coalase into impulses of energy and particles of matter - this is where the knowledge comes from. This is the invisible field very much like the underlying intelligence in DNA, the seat of consciousness.

Days are not far off when quantum healing will be the light of the day. Till then at least it is expected that integrated geriatric medicine may come up in a large scale for the benefit of nearly a million elderly in Mumbai. Very recently Saral meditation4 is coming up as anti-ageing medicine aimed at taking you deeper and deeper inside yourself, until you reach the area untouched by illness.5 Health in its essence is a higher state of consciousness including aging process.

Conclusion
Integrated geriatric medicine has a great scope and need of the hour. Quantum healing is a new concept.

References

1. Dhar HL. Seminar on Integrated Approach - Geriatric Medicine. Bombay Hospital, 14th May 2005; proceedings P. 13-19.
2. Chopra D. Quantum healing. Exploring the progress of mind/body Medicine, Bantam Books New York 1989.
3. Chopra D. Perfect health the complete body mind guide. Bantam Books, London 1990 revised 2001.
4. Dhar HL. Mechanism of Saral Meditation without mantra that improves all round quality of life. BHJ 2004; 46 (3) : 291-4.
5. Dhar HL. Approach to anti-ageing through meditation 2005 (under publication).

Director, Medical Research Centre, Bombay Hospital Trust, Mumbai 400 020.