A study on the method of Taila Bindu Pariksha (oil drop test)

Taila Bindu Pariksha, an ancient method of urine examination for ascertaining the prognosis of diseases, was very popular in the medieval period, the use of which became obsolete after 17(th) Century AD. Technique of this test is very crude and there are chances of variations in the observations. To revive this technique, it is necessary that the methodology of this test should be standardized so that the observations could be reproducible. To standardize the technique, apparently healthy volunteers were selected and various parameters were standardized for doing this test, i.e., shape and size of Patra (testing containers), volume of the urine, size of the oil drop, height of the oil drop from the surface of urine, variety of sesame oil, etc., Based on the literature, the parameters were changed one by one and observations were noted down. The whole method was recorded in the form of video clips for proper evaluation. The parameters standardized on the basis of observations can be considered as standard to be referred in future studies.