Alternative Medicine

Physicians should be concerned about the widespread use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) -- if only because it's giving them a run for their money. The study we read comparing CAM use from 1990 to 1997 demonstrates equal or higher rates of CAM as compared to visits to allopathic physicians. Such physicians should be asking themselves what they are doing wrong.

Is it a lack of available primary care? We studied a month ago how difficult it is for many patients to access affordable primary care. Too few medical school graduates are choosing primary care specialties and more and more Americans are without adequate health insurance. Alternative medicine offers simple remedies for many of the common chronic conditions for which Americans may be unwilling or unable to seek physician care.

Are physicians failing to address emotional and spiritual needs of their patients? The Eisenberg study also highlighted the number of therapies addressing these less concrete, but no less real issues. With the increasingly limited time that physicians have to spend with their patients, how will they be able to address such complex and intimate aspects of health?

Finally, do physicians settle for a cure over health for their patients? "Cure" has become a mystical and revered goal in medicine as medicine looks to define cures for cancer, AIDs, and other life-threatening diseases. However, promoting health involves more than removing disease. Physicians must also seek to bring patients to a point of optimal quality of life. Our readings on life and mortality clearly demonstrated the deficiencies in our healthcare system regarding the value of a person's final days and weeks as opposed to the length of their survival.

A primary care physician educated in the various forms of alternative and complementary medicine will be better equipped to support their patients who utilize these therapies and more willing to refer patients to such practitioners. They can use CAM to supplement a faulty and inadequate system.