Dataset of illness classifications in Sowa Rigpa: Compilations from the Oral Instructions Treatise of the Tibetan medical classic (Rgyud bzhi)

Abstract

This article shares the comprehensive dataset and five visualized examples of disease categories in Tibetan medicine, or Sowa Rigpa (Tib. Gso ba rig pa), translated as the “knowledge field of healing.” Sowa Rigpa is a scholarly Asian traditional medical system rigorously transmitted through canonical texts and oral teachings originating in Tibet with an extensive pharmacopeia, comprehensive treatment repertoire, and nuanced etiological explications of its nosology of diseases. This medical tradition is practiced across a broad region of Asia, particularly in Tibetan regions of China, Himalayan regions of India (Ladakh, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh), Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia, Russia, and recently in Europe and North America. The data herein depicts disease classifications listed in the encyclopedic compendium “Oral Instructions Treatise” (Man ngag rgyud) of the Tibetan medical classic, the Four Medical Treatises (Rgyud bzhi), compiled in written form during the twelfth century CE. Visualized examples depict etiological relations among diseases in five of the fifteen major categories of disease: rLung Illnesses, Béken Illneses, Pediatric Conditions, Eye Conditions and Tropical Infectious Diseases. Disease names were entered into spreadsheet format and categorized by etiological hierarchical structure. Data are written in Unicode Tibetan font to retain fidelity to entries in the classical text, with parallel columns in standard Wylie transliteration. Subsets of the data are visually depicted through a graphic platform called Interactive Tree of Life to demonstrate etiological associations. This dataset is the first publicly available enumeration of the specific diseases, classifications and etiological relationships from the Tibetan medical classic. The data are linked to the article entitled “Tibetan Medical Informatics: An Emerging Field in Sowa Rigpa Pharmacological & Clinical Research” (Dhondrup et al., 2020).