Kottakkal Arya Vaidya Sala Takes Ayurveda Closer to the Patient

In DC Conversations, Managing Trustee and Chief Physician Dr. P. M. Varier reflects on why the institution is embracing a franchise model now, how it plans to safeguard authenticity, and what the future of Ayurveda looks like in a rapidly changing health landscape.

For an institution that has built its credibility over more than a century, the decision to enter a franchise-led model might seem unexpected. But for Dr. Varier, the move is rooted in a simple, long-standing purpose. “Our institution was established with the objective of providing classical Ayurvedic treatment as well as authentic medicines to the needy,” he says, reiterating that propagation has always been as important as practice.

Over the decades, that vision has translated into a vast ecosystem, hospitals, manufacturing units, research centres, and a network of branches and authorised dealers. Yet, access remained a challenge. “To expand our operations, the franchisee can help us in establishing the infrastructure, but we will provide the practitioners as well as the trained therapists,” he explains, adding, “So it is easier for us to reach more people, to give more medical advice and treatment.”

Hyderabad, he points out, was not a random choice. “From the very old days itself, we have been receiving a lot of patients from Andhra Pradesh, we have got requests to establish a hospital in Hyderabad,” he says. The idea had been considered for years but was constrained by cost and logistics, until the franchise model made it viable.

At Trinaya, the format itself marks a shift. Unlike AVS’s hospital-based care, this is designed as a non-residential treatment and wellness centre. “The patient is not required to stay, they can come here, get consulted, get treated, and go back home,” Dr. Varier says. “The focus is on lifestyle and chronic conditions, issues that increasingly define urban health like joint pains, nervous issues, back pain and neck pain,” he notes, pointing to changing work patterns.

Yet, even as the format evolves, certain principles remain non-negotiable. “Quality is the main priority for us. We don’t compromise on quality,” he emphasises. From raw material sourcing to final formulations, every step is rigorously monitored. “Only after getting the approval, do we use it for manufacturing. And after manufacturing, every medicine is again analysed.”

This insistence on control also extends to treatment. All AVS centres, including franchise formats, use only medicines produced in-house and rely on therapists trained within its own system. The concern, as Dr. Varier acknowledges, is dilution, especially in a space where imitation is common. “I myself have seen many centres with our name, that is why we are trying to establish our own centres,” he says, positioning Trinaya as both expansion and correction.

The larger challenge, however, is not just scale, but perception. In an age of social media and misinformation, Ayurveda often finds itself misrepresented. AVS’s response has been steady and institutional. “We are trying to give proper information, and conducting Ayurvedic seminars every year and we teach the patients what real Ayurveda is,” he says, underlining the importance of education alongside treatment.

For Dr. Varier, the endurance of AVS ultimately comes down to something less tangible but deeply consistent. “It is because of our sincere approach to everything, we don’t compromise on quality in any place,” he says. Growth, in this sense, is not about reinvention but extension.

That philosophy is echoed by CEO K. Harikumar, who sees Trinaya as a way of taking care closer to where patients already are. “We thought, why not go where the people are,” he says, adding that many conditions caused by sedentary lifestyle, from frozen shoulder to spondylitis, do not require hospitalisation but still need structured care. The model, he notes, is built to ensure that “there is no dilution in the core principles… we send our own trained people and insist that they work as per standard operating procedures.”

In many ways, Trinaya represents a quiet shift, one that recognises that Ayurveda today must not only heal, but also adapt. The question is not whether it can scale, but whether it can do so without losing what made it endure in the first place.