How to Use Alternative & Complementary Medicine: Introduction
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This article is from the Health Articles series.
How to Use Alternative & Complementary Medicine: Introduction
During the past decade, the American public's interest in alternative medicine has skyrocketed. The evidence for this trend is everywhere -- in the media, in the growing number of popular books on "wellness" and non-traditional therapies for illness, and in booming sales of supplements and herbs.
The magnitude of this trend was highlighted in a report by David Eisenberg, M.D., of Harvard Medical School published in a 1993 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. Eisenberg estimated that Americans made approximately 425 million visits to alternative therapy providers during 1990 and that expenditures associated with these therapies were comparable to non-reimbursed expenses incurred for all hospitalizations.
The growth in the use of alternative medicine has been accompanied by more subtle changes in the attitudes of both patients and physicians. Though still widely used, the term "alternative medicine" has been gradually falling out of favor in recent years. Many who work in the field feel that the term reinforces the old and divisive (and inaccurate) stereotype of desperate and naive patients foregoing promising mainstream therapies in favor of unproven or "alternative" therapies offered by "quack" practitioners.
A vast array of approaches fall under the heading of complementary medicine. Some, such as acupuncture and Ayurveda (the traditional medicine of India), are ancient traditions used by millions of people over thousands of years. Most cultures have also developed herbal traditions based upon the local medicinal plants. Other approaches, such as macrobiotics or Anthroposophy are branches of wider philosophical systems applied to medicine. Chiropractic and homeopathy are examples of systems that arose alongside orthodox medicine -- that view disease processes much differently than mainstream medicine. Mind-body therapies (e.g., stress reduction techniques, biofeedback, meditation) comprise a large class of approaches that owe a great deal to the spiritual traditions of the East.
The most effective use of complementary therapies is often in combination with mainstream therapies. There is evidence, for example, that Chinese herbs can potentiate the effectiveness and lessen the side effects of some chemotherapies and that acupuncture can greatly reduce the nausea connected with cancer therapy. In the same way, chiropractic or acupuncture can greatly reduce or even eliminate the need for analgesics for chronic back pain.
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