Abstract:
A medical activity in terms of health seeking behavior is an effective
social and personal condition which experienced by each individual. People can choose
any types of medical system when they want to heal from their sickness or the illness,
wounds and other social diseases. There are number of medical systems available as
western and alternative medical systems such as indigenous medicine (Ayurvedic),
Unani, Acupuncture, Homeopathy, allopathic and etc to cure them for better health.
Ayurvedic is one of the famous alternative medicines which was very popular and
practiced widely by many people in India and, now it is widely consumed by the people
in Sri Lanka. Therefore, this study is significant as it investigate why people have poor
consumption of Ayurvedic medicine compared to western medical system although the
government is promoting indigenous practices. The main objective of this research is to
illustrate the conceptual explanation on health seeking or healing behavior and its
practice on both western and Ayurvedic medicines in the Nintavur Divisional
Secretariat area. And also this paper aims to understand comparatively the different
healing behavior of people in western and Ayurvedic medical systems in the area of
research pertaining to their different types of socio-economical and cultural
backgrounds. This is primarily a qualitative study. Data was collected from primary as
well as secondary sources. The primary data are collected through questionnaire, key
informant interview, direct observation and focus group discussion (FGD). The
secondary data was collected from the record of the District hospital, Nintavur and from
the record of Government Rural Ayurvedic hospital, Nintavur. Finally, it can be given
the result as the number of people go to western medicine for certain reasons and a few
percentages of people go to Ayurvedic medicine for some other reason based on their
personal and common consideration.
