MANAGEMENT OF ESSENTIAL HYPERTENSION USING HERBAL FORMULATION WITH AND WITHOUT GOKSHURA KWATHA – A COMPARATIVE STUDY

Hypertension is one of the major causes of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality worldwide. It is a global health problem affecting the people of different ethnicity and ages around the world. An estimated 1.13 billion people worldwide have hypertension, most (two-thirds) living in low- and middle-income countries. According to WHO (2015) the overall prevalence of hypertension in India was 24.2% and 22% among the men and women respectively. Hypertension is called a silent killer, non-communicable chronic disease because it rarely exhibits symptoms before it damages vital organs like kidney, brain or heart. In Ayurveda there is not a single disease which resemble with hypertension, but physician should understand the disease through Dosha, Dushya, Samprapti and initiate the treatment. A lot of potent modern antihypertensive drugs are available but none of them are free from untoward side-effects. So, a clinical study was done using herbal formulation containing Sarpaghandha, Sankhpushpi, Arjuna, Jatamansi and Ashwagandha in the form of Ghanvati. A comparative study was done as this Ghanvati was given with and without Gokshur kwath. For clinical study 52 (Group A- 25 and Group B- 27) clinically diagnosed patients of essential hypertension who fulfil inclusion criteria were selected irrespective of their age, sex, religion, occupation etc. and simple random sampling technique was followed for grouping the patients into 2 groups. All the patients selected for the clinical trial were divided in two groups ‘A’ and ‘B’. Patients of Group A were given 250 mg of Ghanvati two times a day with water as Anupan and patients of Group B were given 250 mg of Ghanvati with water as Anupan and Gokshur kwath both two times a day. Duration of the study for each group was 30 days. The present study showed that herbal formulation is also effective in the management of essential hypertension. Keywords: Essential hypertension, Ghanvati