Ayurveda Clinical Trial for Rheumatoid Arthritis

New Delhi: The Ayush Ministry has initiated the world's first multicentre phase-3 clinical trial to examine the efficacy of Ayurveda in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis, according to an official statement.

The clinical trial will be conducted following the International Council for Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Pharmaceuticals for Human Use Good Clinical Practice guidelines, it stated.

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It will be closely monitored by Dr. Daniel Erick Furst, a renowned rheumatologist at the University of California, the statement mentioned.

This project is one of the first multi-center phase-3 double-blind double-dummy clinical trials on the efficacy of Ayurveda in the management of rheumatoid arthritis, it claimed.

The trial will be conducted by AVP Research Foundation, affiliated with the Arya Vaidya Pharmacy (Coimbatore) Ltd and the Central Council for Research in Ayurveda, an agency under the Ayush Ministry.

Dr. Somit Kumar, Director of AVP Research Foundation and co-investigator of this study, said, "AMRA, a double-blind double-dummy randomized clinical trial, is taking Ayurveda research in rheumatology to a global stage."

Dr. M N Shubhashree, Research Officer, Central Ayurveda Research Institute for Metabolic Disorders, Bengaluru, said the study is expected to begin in May and be completed in the next two years.

The sample size has increased almost 5 times, from 48 patients to 240, Dr. Shubhashree said.

"Clinical trials will be conducted at:

• AVP Research Foundation in Coimbatore
• Central Ayurveda Research Institute for Metabolic Disorders in Bengaluru
• Raja Ramdeo Anandilala Central Ayurveda Research Institute for Cancer in Mumbai

Earlier, the National Institutes of Health in the USA funded a clinical trial at the University of Washington in Seattle to compare the efficacy and safety of classical Ayurvedic treatment to standard Allopathic treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

The findings of this study have been published in prestigious journals such as the Annals of Rheumatic Diseases and the Journal of Clinical Rheumatology, the statement said.

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