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Traditional Medicine
Starts To Examine Alternative Therapies |
by Judy Gerstel
We're on the brink of going back to the future in medicine.
Stem cells, genes and transplants are getting the headlines, but the bigger
story may be that medicine is advancing beyond the biomedical model and
embracing medical pluralism.
The overwhelming trend is the integration of orthodox medicine, defined by
its pharmaceuticals and invasive techniques, with other ancient,
old-fashioned and unconventional healing practices.
The future of medicine, it seems, is not only in the high-tech laboratory
and the surgical suite but also on the NST and massage tables, at the
herbalists and the health food store, behind the therapist's closed door,
but most especially in the cerebral hemisphere and the mind.
This week's edition of Annals Of Internal Medicine, the August journal of
the conservative American College of Physicians-American Society of Internal
Medicine, kicks off an unprecedented series on complementary and alternative
medicine.
And they take the subject seriously, referring to "postmodern medical
diversity." It's probably the first time that Haitian "vodun", hair
analysis, crystals, magnets and charismatic healing have all been mentioned
without derision in the pages of Annals.
Authored by David Eisenberg, MD, and Ted Kaptchuk, OMD (Doctor of Oriental
Medicine) of Harvard Medical School and its division of complementary and
integrative medical therapies, the series considers everything from
acupuncture to iridology to chicken soup to Reiki to vitamins to
"ethno-medicine."
"The alternative medicine `boom' is not new," Kaptchuk says. "What's new is
that orthodox medicine has abandoned the crusade against alternative
medicine and is trying to accommodate widespread patient belief and
acceptance of these practices."
MDs are unlikely to suddenly start recommending copper bracelets to combat
arthritis or stopping a nosebleed by placing a a red string around the neck,
but they are acknowledging that a patient's belief in healing properties may
be just as powerful in many medical situations as the interventions of the
physician.
In this week's issue of the journal Science, there's stunning testimony from
University of British Columbia researchers about how the mind can heal the
body. Their study suggests that the placebo effect in Parkinson's disease
produces the same neurological outcome as active drugs used to treat
Parkinson's: an increase in dopamine release by neurons impaired by the
disease.
The placebo effect occurs when individuals take an inactive substance,
rather than an active drug, and experience beneficial effects only because
they believe they're receiving beneficial treatment.
"The magnitude of the placebo effect was surprising," admits UBC researcher
Ral de la Fuente-Ferny¥ndez. "The greater the expectation, the greater the
effect of the mind's healing power."
He adds, "This paper shows that there must be a bridge between traditional
medicine and natural medicine."
In studies of the impact of psychological therapies on longevity in patients
with metastatic cancers, Ontario Cancer Institute senior scientist Alastair
Cunningham found an association between intense spiritual work and longer
survival.
"The psychological dimension offers promise for the treatment of many
physical diseases," writes Cunningham in the forthcoming issue of Advances
In Mind-Body Medicine, an innovative, peer-reviewed scholarly journal
published in the U.S.
"Modern medicine is conservative," says Cunningham. "My approach is to try
to play on the medical playing field and give evidence."
Scientific, evidence-based proof of the placebo effect and the psychological
dimension is only one reason for the dramatic shift right now toward
inclusiveness and away from the historical antagonism to alternative
practices by the medical establishment, say the Annals authors.
"People generally adopt multiple healing practices, even when biomedicine is
generally available," note the Annals authors.
This sheer force of numbers comes at the same time as a trend toward
consumer-oriented medicine and away from "doctor knows best."
More and more, the increasingly sophisticated patient is an educated partner
in medical decisions. Knowledgeable health consumers are letting the medical
profession know they want inclusive medicine.
The medical profession is responding for two reasons. First, there's money
to be made from patients, since most alternative services must be paid for
privately.
But with the US leading the way, there's also more funding for alternative
and complementary medicine. American researchers vie for grants from the
prestigious National Institutes of Health's Office of Alternative Medicine.
And insurance providers such as HMOs in the US are beginning to realize that
alternative practices can be just as effective and a lot cheaper than
expensive high-tech interventions.
But what may appear to be new and cutting-edge is only a change in
perception and attitude by orthodox medicine, maintains Harvard's Kaptchuk,
co-author of the Annals article.
"I'm so bored with people being hypocritical and pretending that all this is
new, rather than saying that they've changed standards," he says. "That's a
kind of distortion, not looking at the reality of the phenomena. It's the
response that's different. What is new is that conventional medicine has to
redefine its relationship to this phenomena."
Kaptchuk claims that orthodox medicine's nascent inclusiveness of
complementary and alternative medicine is "a breathless attempt to co-opt
it."
"It's market-driven," he says, with distaste. His cynicism is
understandable.
"In 1970 I was arrested in Cambridge (Mass.) for practicing medicine without
a license," Kaptchuk says. "Now I'm a professor at Harvard Medical School."
The Star.com August 10, 2001
My Comment: This is very amusing. Just 20 years ago, the chiropractic
profession was fending off the AMA in their attempt to monopolize health
care and to exterminate the chiropractic profession. Now, they're tactics
have changed and some amazing new realization has overtaken them to embrace
other treatment methods to treat human disease and suffering. One would
wonder WHAT the ulterior motive is here. Could it be MONEY?
Don't get me wrong. I'm glad to see the transformation. BUT, I can't wonder
if there's another purpose going on here other than the interest of the
patient's health. Food for thought.
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