For the Quechua people, the origins of many diseases are mysterious. Therefore, to diagnose and cure, they have to simultaneously resort to explanations; ancestral cosmic remedies - including a rich tradition in the use of the Andean pharmacology -; medical concepts that Colony brought with it and concepts from the modern science. Seeding with many species in many places at different times, the farmer reduce agricultural risks with the same rationality that it is facing with diseases.
Treatments
For native conception, there are not differences between natural or magical diseases / treatments. It is more unified, like a system of relations between the body, its several souls, the society and the cosmos, full of so alive and real beings as we. It is like inseparable parts that form a harmonious whole. The Andean medicine has a globalized conception of body and soul, person, society and the cosmos; it has natural treatments, personal cares and ritual remedies that facilitate the satisfactory response of the Andean patient.
Yatiri(Ay) Especialista en ritual y medicina entre los aymaras y atacameƱos.
Yatiri (the one that knows) is the specialist for diagnosis and treatment of all type of disorder physical-psychic-cosmic (including diseases). Moreover, its specialization could include learning processes, and as a last resort, could be of supernatural type, because of to have been touched by a lightning or to have already received superior powers in the birth. Simultaneously, the Yatiri is a doctor, fortune teller and priest. It dominates the ritual resources, although it also knows the natural ones. Within these, jampiri or qulliri (the one that heals) is specialized in diseases and has a wide knowledge of herbs and other natural medicinal resources.