Research Methodology & Medical Biostatistics for Undergraduate Scholars of Ayurveda

Foreword Revalidation has become an indispensable of the day to upbring and update the old concepts to view them considering present day science and to make it applicable to the needs and acceptance of present society. Research is nothing but careful and systematic work to seek facts, information; it may be the renovation of the age-old concepts, by scrutinizing them with statistical parameters of present era for ac ceptance of present day scientific community and also for the safety and welfare of the suffering mass.

There are so many things we wish to know, which cannot be observed by single observation or a single measurement. Hence to establish a fact, we wish to envisage the behavior of a man who like all men is rather a variable quantity and must be observed repeatedly and not once for all. We must be able to compare age group with another, once race with another or the effects of medicines in the individual with the norm for his age, race or class. All in all it certainly appears that sound statistical sense are coming to be an essential of a liberal education.

Hence the knowledge of process of various research methods, collection and presentation of the data available and presenting them in a lucid manner after scrutiny by statistical parameters with valued norms, is the need of the hour in the exploration and development of science. More so in Ayurveda, it is a treasure of ancient knowledge from prevedic period to the date, hence exploration is the need of the day. Though it is an evidence based science since times immemorial, which proved its efficacy from time to time and served the suffering mass, it has become necessity to revalidate with innovative applica tions.

Now, it is the duty of us to focus and enlighten that wisdom to the context of present society. Hence it has become a primary duty of Ayurvedic physician and researcher to prove their eminence by bring ing the subject for the utility of the present day society.

Preface Quest of search for something new or reinvent the new knowl edge for the betterment of mankind is as old as the human tradition and it is not new to the Ayurveda. It is already stated by our research ers that "necessity is the mother of invention". Ayurveda science is having treasure of knowledge like an ocean. As the advancement takes place in science and technologies, it has created lot of scope to probe the old sutras by taking help of advanced modern techniques into consideration for revalidation of old concepts in more effective way.

There are many book are available on Research Methodol ogy and Medical Biostatistics and these books are written by follow ing old syllabus for the benefit of post graduate scholars. As the new research methodology and medical biostatistics syllabus is introduced to undergraduate students, but no any such books are available for same syllabus in one place. Hence it produces difficulty in understanding the subject matter. For this, the undergraduate students need to search available scattered subject matter in those books only. So this book entitled with "Research Methodology and Medi cal Biostatistics" is specifically compiled and written for the benefit of undergraduate students of Ayurveda keeping in view the newly framed syllabus (Revised scheme four) by C.C.I.M. Here I have tried to compile the matter by incorporating the views of both Ayurveda and Contemporary science along with suitable examples wherever necessary.

This book consists two sections. Section A- Deals with fun damentals of research such as definition of research, its types, literary research, different research designs, significance of ethical committee, data mining, bioinformatics and different methods of communi cation of research trials in the form of research article, books etc. Section B- Deals with the knowledge of biostatistics used in assess ment of safety, efficacy and effectiveness of trials to draw the rel evant conclusions. It also deals with source of data, presentation of data and analysis of data by using different techniques, such as stan dard deviations, coefficient of variance, test of significance, etc.

**Contents and Sample Pages**