The only state medical organization in Russia, where both modern knowledge and treatment methods as well as traditional ones are used, operates in Ulan-Ude. We will tell you about the unique Center of Oriental Medicine.
The main principle of treatment here is based on an integrated approach, when not one individual disease is treated, but the body as a whole. The main emphasis is on natural methods of treatment, including reflexology, herbal medicine, physiotherapy, balneotherapy, physical therapy, hirudotherapy, mechanical and kinesitherapy.
The Center has departments for medical rehabilitation of patients with diseases of the central and peripheral nervous system, the musculoskeletal system, as well as a department of geriatrics — diseases of older people.
Treatment can be obtained free of charge under the compulsory health insurance program. In addition to the in-patient department, there is a clinic in the very center of the city at 10 Sobornaya Street, where you can get outpatient medical care, as well as diagnostics of the body using traditional medicine methods. The institution is located in a historical building of the XIX century. The Gendarmerie Department building was built in 1874; later it became a residential building. Now it is an object of cultural heritage of regional importance, protected by the state.
A little history
The Buryat branch of traditional medicine has absorbed all the best from the Mongolian, Tibetan and Chinese medical systems. At the end of the XIX and beginning of the XX centuries, Pyotr Badmaev became the most famous promoter of Tibetan medicine in Russia. He translated the Tibetan "Zhud-Shi" medical treatise, and over the 37 years of his activity, he treated more than half a million patients, including members of the royal family.
Since the 70s of the last century, scientific research in the field of Tibetan medicine has been carried out at the Buryat Scientific Center of the SB RAS, which has proven the efficiency of its diagnostic and treatment methods. This became the basis for the creation of the Center of Oriental Medicine. The history of the Center began in 1989, when the first pharmacy of medicinal herbs was opened — originally, they were collected by pharmacists themselves. A year later, a clinic appeared on Verkhnyaya Berezovka and a polyclinic in the city center — on Sobornaya Street (at that time the street was called Linhovoina). And in 1993, the Center of Oriental Medicine was listed in the fixed assets of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Buryatia. Ten years later, the Center began serial production of herbal teas, and now there is a workshop for the production of herbal medicines. Also, patients are now received in the rehabilitation treatment clinic in the village of Goryachinsk on Lake Baikal and in the in-patient department in a new building on Verkhnyaya Berezovka.
Power of healing herbs
One of the main directions of the Center’s work is the production of herbal blends. Their range reaches 50 items, all of them are created according to the original recipes of the Center’s doctors and scientists of the Buryat Scientific Center. According to the creators, herbal blends are safe and efficient as an aid in the prevention and treatment of various diseases. Thus, in a pharmacy of medicinal herbs, you can purchase blends for metabolic disorders, diseases of skin, gastroenteric tract, cardiovascular system, musculoskeletal system, and nervous system. "Taban Arshan" herbal blend is of particular pride (it is translated from Buryat as "five healing springs"). It consists of shoots of crystal tea ledum, wormwood sage grass, shoots of low juniper, willow bark and shoots of bush cinquefoil. Therapeutic baths with this blend have anti-inflammatory, wound healing and antibacterial effects.
Diagnostics and treatment
To diagnose diseases, both traditional methods and modern clinical laboratory and ultrasound examinations are used. Doctors are proficient in electroacupuncture according to Voll, finger pulse diagnostics, as well as diagnostics using an automated pulse diagnostic complex. This complex is an original development of scientists from the Buryat Scientific Center and can simultaneously assess the condition of 12 internal organs, which makes it possible to identify diseases in the early stages even in the absence of their clinical manifestations.
In treatment, such methods of oriental medicine as acupuncture and bloodletting, moxibustion (cauterization) and hirudotherapy (use of medicinal leeches), breathing exercises, yoga therapy and wushu gymnastics are used along with the most modern technologies. Therapeutic massage and manual therapy are also actively used — a treatment method based on manual influence on the patient’s body.
One of the new directions of the Center known as therapeutic fasting, or a calorie restriction diet, is practiced in the in-patient department in the village of Goryachinsk, on the picturesque shore of Lake Baikal. Under medical supervision, patients briefly refuse food, as a result of which the body switches to internal nutrition using its own reserves. During treatment, a mode of restoration and cleansing of the body is launched, and the weight is normalized. Baths and showers using nitrogen-siliceous waters are also used here, which together with the healing Baikal air gives a powerful healing effect.
In addition to treatment and production of herbal blends, the Center continues research work and also trains traditional medicine specialists together with Buryat State University. Leading athletes of Buryatia and Russian cosmonauts undergo rehabilitation here. During the operation of the Center of Oriental Medicine, more than 600 thousand people received treatment and the number of patients increases every year.