Introduction
Gold is used as medicine since long back. We found its reference since Vedic era by its synonym ‘hiranya’. Gold is always respected as a precious metal. Our ancients were very well aware of its uses. We have a tradition of using gold as ornament, and also for medicinal use. In kashyapsamhita, sushrut samhita, charaksamhita, ashtang hruday, bhavprakash, bhaishajya ratnavali and yogratnakar, after birth it is advised to give gold rubbed on clean stone and give with honey and cow’s ghee. It is told that it increases baby’s immunity, intelligence, strength, appetite, complexion, and health. Today we are expending lot’s to improve children health still facing many health issues so decided to study in detail about suvarnprashan method, its uses, practical application of suvarnprashan in today’s era in this article. In my clinic shree panchakarma and beauty clinic I am giving suvarnprashan on every pushyanakshatra since May 2016. To discuss its clinical findings will be the outlook of further article.
Materials and Methods
Literary review
In mansmruti, it is mentioned that dwija {brahman} should undergo two samskar (rituals) to purify himself from the impurities of beej (sperm and ovum) and to get rid of impurities associated with stay in uterus. The sanskar mentioned in manusmriti, are jatakama in which immediately after birth, after cutting of umbilical cord baby has to leak mixture of gold, honey and ghee with chanting mantra. And the second sanskar, chudakarma is a procedure of tonsure.
In charak samhita, sharirsthan adhyay, jatisutriyashr adhyay, after delivery first clean baby’s mouth with ghee and saindhava, put cotton soaked in ghee on head, then cut umbilical cord and put medicated oil on wound. Then give honey and ghee with chanting mantra after that give mother’s milk.1
In sushrut samhita, after child’s birth, after leaking honey and saindhav, baby will vomit the amniotic fluid then put cotton soaked in ghee on his head after that cut the cord and then allow licking gold, honey and ghee with anamika finger- finger near to little finger to the baby. And also give bath with bala and gold, silver medicated water. On first day of birth it is advised to give honey, ghee and gold thrice a day with chanting mantra, 2nd day and 3rd day, lakshmana medicated ghee, 4th day honey and ghee twice a day then start mother’s milk. In Medhaayushkamiya adhyay, sushrut narrates bilva, vacha medicines to administer with gold and ghee honey with chanting ‘shreesukta’ on pushya nakshatra gives long and healthy life.2
In Ashtanhruday, immediately after birth after chanting mantra about baby’s healthy growth, long life and praying for his health, after cutting umbilical cord immediately advised to give mixture of herbs brahmi, endri, vacha shankhapuspi or, emlica officinalis- amla powder with gold, or gold with herbs, and honey and ghee allow to leak. Vagbhat explained that as mother’s milk is not there up to 3 days after delivery, honey ghee, and herbs combination thrice a day we can give as baby’s food.3
In Astang sangraha, eindri, brahmi, shankhapushpi, vacha, or combination of vacha, shatavari, ananta and brahmi, with honey and ghee, in harenu quantity, given to increase baby’s intelligence, health, life, and strength.4
In kashyap samhita, sutrasthan lehadhyay, kashyap in detail narrates about baby’s jatakarma. Systematically he narrates about lehana (medicines or gold with honey and ghee administration).5
Dosage
Immediately after birth in quantity equivalent to vidang fruit, gradually at every month we should increase quantity, but it should not exceed more than aamlaki (gooseberry) size.6
A few other available references regarding per day dose of Swarna Bhasma from various texts are as listed below:
As per Sharandar samhita, by taking these adult dosages as reference standards, dosage in children can be calculated.
Indication
Mother with no milk, or less milk, or having disease’.
Baby with more vata, pitta and less kapha and also babies which are not satisfied with mother’s milk, not sleeping at night, crying, having good appetite and less excretion of feces and urine, should administer lehan. Constipating babies and healthy but very thin and weak babies should administer lehan.4
Contraindication
Baby with following disease should avoid lehan sanskar-
Loss of appetite, more kapha prominence, sleepy, having indigestion, heavy food consumption, with more excretion of feces and urine, such babies should avoid lehan sanskar. Baby having diseases of head and neck region, jaundice, inflammation, anemia, dyspnea, heart disease, cough, diseases of anus, bladder and abdomen, gaseous distention, mumps, vomiting, nausea lehan should be avoided. Also baby of diseased mother or mother taking all rasa food, should avoid lehan.6
Daily, after food consumption, in cloudy, and windy environment we should avoid lehan, also while doing lehan we should think about mother’s food consumption habits (satmya), the climate where the baby is born (desha and kal), season in which we are giving lehan all these factors are important while doing lehan karma.4
Procedure of lehan
Acharya Kashyapa coined the term Swarnaprashana for administration of gold. This unique formula has been explained wherein gold should be triturated along with water, honey, and ghee on a clean stone facing eastern direction and made the Shishu (infant) lick the same.4
Medicines advised to use for Lehan
Kashyap samhita: ghee+honey+gold
Brahmi, mandukparni, triphala, vacha, chitrak, shatpushpa, shatavari, danti, nagbala, trivrut, all these medicines separately one at a time is good for intelligence.
Brahmi ghruta, kalyanak ghruta, panchagavya, medhya ghruta
Manjishtha, brahmi, bala, chitrak, triphala, honey+ghee
Abhayagruta, savardhan ghrut.
Bhaishajyaratnavali9 amla+haritaki+honey+ghee and kushtha, vacha, haritaki, brahmi+suvarnabhasma+honey+ghee
Different combinations are narrated by different authors.
The specific benefits of Swarnaprashana are as follows6
Medha Agni Bala Vardhanam (improvement of intellect, digestion, metabolism, immunity, and physical strength).
Ayushyam (promoting lifespan).
Mangalam (auspicious).
Punyam (righteous).
Vrushyam (aphrodisiac).
Varnyam (enhancement of color and complexion).
Grahapaham (protection from evil spirits and microorganisms).
The specific benefits of Swarnaprashana according to the duration of administration have been mentioned such as:4
If administered for 1 month, the baby will become Parama Medhavi (highly intelligent) and Vyadhibhir Na Cha Drusyate (will not be affected by any disease)
If administered for 6 months, the baby will become Srutadhara (will be able to remember the things, which are just heard).
All the above said benefits are indicating the enhancement of all favorable factors required for proper growth and development of a child, which is considered to be rapid during Shaishavavastha (infancy).2
As there are a number of forms of Swarna mentioned, picking the apt form is a major chore. Acharya Kashyapa has mentioned Kanaka (a synonym of gold) triturated along with water, honey, and ghee. The idea behind this may be that as per the availability at that time in its pure form, gold could be administered directly and by rubbing on a stone micro particles of gold might be procured effortlessly.4 Later, other forms of Swarna were mentioned especially Bhasma which may be due to the advancement of pharmaceutical methods in Ayurveda like Rasashastra (metallurgy) as a separate branch of Ayurveda. Any form of gold, which is having better bioavailability should be the first choice for internal administration.10 The bioavailability of all the forms of gold is yet to be established. A few related study reports are cited below. Swarna Bhasma is said to have nanoparticles of gold which comprises gold-containing particles that are globular and have an average size of 56–57 nm.10 In blood compatibility study, it was found that Swarna Bhasma contained gold nanoparticles with crystallite size 28–35 nm and was 90% pure gold. Another study found that colloidal gold uptake in gastrointestinal tract is dependent on particle size that is, smaller particles cross the gastrointestinal tract more readily.11
For my study I used suvarnabhasma of Dhootpapeshwar Company, which is prepared with procedure described in bharat bhaishajya ratnakar and carried out a scientific study to prove its bioavailability.10 With this I used brahmi ghruta and kalyanak ghruta and honey of fonda Ghat Company. For my study 140 children (bala) from the age of 1 month up to 16 years are selected in shree panchakarma and beauty clinic. They administered suvarnprashan on every pushyanakshatra with chanting mahamrutunjay mantra. To state clinical finding will be the outlook of next article.
Discussion/Result
In Ayurveda suvarnprashan is a beautiful procedure narrated by all authors. Most of the time it is immediately after birth, when mother’s milk is less, to fulfill baby’s hunger suvarnprashan is told. Suvarn/ gold is a precious metal to give health, immunity, complexion, and intelligence. So if we started giving its safest form since birth it will prove to increase baby’s overall health, immunity and intelligence.4, 7, 8, 9
Today we give immunization schedule against particular disease. We give different dosage for different single bacteria or few viruses. Some time we use live or attenuated vaccine which stimulates our T –lymphocyte to create artificial immunity. Day to day different unknown viruses are coming and challenging our immunity. You can imagine how day by day we are compromising our immunity. Previously yield of crops was less, size of grain, fruits, was small, but they have some firmness, they have capacity to regrow when they found suitable condition; such crops can easily fight against most of the pests. Today with all agricultural development, and economic development, size and yield of crop is increased, but what about quality? The seeds from these crops are unable to re-grow; they need pesticides since they start growing. Lesson from this is we should develop our innate immunity. For that we have to increase baby’s immunity for 2-3 generations with traditional healthy habits.
Suvarn prashan is a ray of hope in this situation. Our respectable literature with one voice narrating importance of suvarnprashan,12 we must not ignore it. As per Kashayp samhita, lehan is recommended for vata pitta dominant babies deprived of mother’s milk with good appetite and not suffering from any disease. Lehan is not recommended for continuous use this may refer to importance of mother’s milk. Aacharya Kashyap, narrated importance of continuous suvarnprshan for 6 months to 1 year. As per ayureda, pushya nakshatra is good or holistic to prepare medicine or to start some new things; so now a day there is tradition to administer suvarnprashan on pushya nakshatra.9
There are numbers of forms of suvarn to administer.in old age when materiology was not developed people use gold directly triturated on stone with water and mix with honey and ghee or medicated ghee or some herbs and given to the child. Later on as meteorology developed, metals are used as a medicine after purifying them with herbs and its ‘nano’ form which will be more absorbable in body is prepared in the form of ‘bhasma’.10 There are many literatures available for the procedure of suvarn bhasma preparation,7, 8 out of which the procedure described in Bharat Bhaishaja Ratnakar is widely used.
Decided it’s standardize formula as below
Suvarnbhasma 3.9 mg for 1 month baby
Increase 1 mg for every month
For 1 year not to exceed 12.5 mg
After that per kilogram body weight dose of suvarnbhasma should be calculated as its dose is 12.5 to 62.5mg.
For 16 years child it will be 62.5mg.
Approximately 1.25mg/kg body weight will be the ideal dose for children in the age group 10-16 years age.
Conclusion
Suvarnprashan is a jatakarm sanskar narrated by charak, sushruta, vagbhat, kashyap, bhavprakash, bhashajya ratnavali. After birth, baby should be leaked with herbs like brahmi, amla, guduchi, shatavari, bala or a medicated ghee like brahmi ghruta, kalyanak ghruta, panchagavya ghrua with suvarn bhasma which is the safest form of gold and honey
After that on every pushya nakshatra we should allow baby to administer suvarnprashan. Although there is no support for specific day for suvarnprashan sanskar, probability of administration of mass scale public administration increases with such tradition. It is good to administer more and more doses, as probability to get benefits increases with number of administration. Suvarnprashan enhances baby’s strength, immunity, complexion and intelligence.
Dosage for Suvarnbhasma will be 3.9mg for 1 month baby, gradually we can increase 1 gm per month and for 1 year it will be maximum 12.5mg. But 1.25mg per kilogram body weight will be the ideal dose.
My further study may enlighten this statement. This study was only for literature review.
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