Exploring the Traditional Health Practices among the Rabhas of Goalpara district

Abstract

Traditional Medicine and traditional healer have wide spread popularity and practiced in societies like Australian aborigines, African tribes, Indian communities, etc. The World Health Organization defines traditional medicine as ;the sum total of the knowledge, skills, and practices based on the theories, beliefs, and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or not, used in the maintenance of health as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement or treatment of physical and mental illness". The traditional medical practitioner or traditional healer can be defined as ; someone who is recognized by the community in which he lives as competent to provide health care by using vegetable, animal and mineral substances and certain other methods based on the social, cultural and religious backgrounds as well as the prevailing knowledge, attitudes and beliefs regarding physical, mental and social well-being and the causation of disease and disability in the community; (Shankar. R., et al., 2012).