NTN: Systems of medicine explained: What you need to know

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NTN: Systems of medicine explained: What you need to know

Mon, 1 May 2006 10:14:11 -0700

 

 

 

 

NewsTarget Insider Alert (www.NewsTarget.com)

HEALTH SOLUTIONS

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(Please forward to others who may benefit)

 

Know the difference between " complementary medicine " and " alternative

medicine? " What about " traditional medicine " and " conventional

medicine? " If you've ever wondered about these or any other medical

systems, you won't want to miss today's NewsTarget feature. We explore

the differences between various practices, and what you need to know

about each one.

 

story at http://www.newstarget.com/019365.html

 

Systems of medicine explained: Conventional, alternative, integrative,

complementary and more

Posted Monday, May 01, 2006 by Mike Adams

 

What's the deal with all the different systems of medicine? And what's

the difference between " Western medicine " and " conventional medicine? "

Here, you'll find some honest answers.

 

" Conventional medicine " refers to the classic medical training offered

through mainstream medical schools. This is a drugs-and-surgery

approach to medicine that largely excludes nutrition, wellness,

mind-body medicine, patient education, and other natural therapies.

 

" Organized medicine " refers to the collection of organizations that

promote conventional medicine. This encompasses pharmaceutical

companies, the FDA, hospitals, doctors, medical schools, and medical

organizations such as the American Medical Association as well as

disease organizations like the American Cancer Society and the

American Diabetes Association. It's called organized medicine because

it is an organized system of profit-minded players who engage in the

marketing, screening, diagnosis and treatment of diseases, all under

the watchful eye of the FDA, using tactics that resemble organized crime.

 

" Western medicine " refers to the type of medicine practiced in the

West; the United States, Western Europe, and so on. It's based on the

philosophical foundations of Western thinking, which maintains that a

body is only a collection of its parts, and that by isolating the

parts and studying them separately, you can understand the whole.

 

This philosophy stands in great contrast to Eastern philosophies, the

practitioners of which believe that the whole can only be understood

through the synergistic functioning of its parts. " Eastern medicine "

looks at the whole patient, the whole body, the whole experience, and

never believes that just treating one organ or using one chemical,

drug, or herb is the answer to any health condition.

 

" Traditional Chinese medicine, " sometimes shortened to TCM, involves

the treatment of patients using the fundamental approaches of healing

developed over the last 4000 years in China. The treatments in Chinese

medicine include acupuncture, Chinese herbs, and Tui-Na, which

resembles massage therapy combined with therapeutic touch. Chinese

medicine has the longest history, and the most practical application,

of any system of medicine in the world, outdating Western medicine by

about 3800 years. In China, doctors were practicing relatively

advanced medicine before the birth of Christ. Western medicine, in

response, dismisses everything under Chinese medicine, ignoring the

long history of safe and effective use of Chinese herbs, acupuncture,

and other philosophies espoused by Traditional .

 

Chinese medicine is not limited to China, by the way. It is practiced

throughout Asia, including Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, and many

other countries. The way it is practiced in the United States is not

true Chinese medicine. Chinese medicine education has become

Westernized in the United States. Just like the Chinese food served in

the United States is nothing like Chinese food purchased in China,

Chinese medicine in the United States doesn't match the Chinese

medicine practiced in China.

 

" Ayurvedic medicine " is a system of holistic medicine practiced widely

in India and throughout Southeast Asia. It is also gaining popularity

and recognition in the United States, Europe, Australia and many other

areas of the world as people come to recognize the inherent wisdom and

innate safety of Ayurvedic medicine. Based on thousands of years of

development and use, Ayurvedic medicine is organized around the energy

patterns of individuals (the way they use their bodies, what they eat,

how they digest, levels of body heat, etc.) and treatment using a wide

array of medicinal herbs and substances (like essential oils, coconut

oil, and so on). There is also a prominent recognition of the

mind/body link in Ayurvedic medicine.

 

Recent scientific studies have shown popular Ayurvedic herbs to

exhibit powerful medicinal effects, even from a Western point of view.

Turmeric, for example, halts the growth of cancer tumors. Cinnamon

stabilizes blood sugar, and gymnema sylvestre helps block dietary

sugars while supporting the regeneration of insulin-producing beta

cells in the pancreas. Ayurvedic medicine has known all this -- and

much more -- for centuries. Western doctors, of course, completely

dismiss the entire system of Ayurvedic medicine as quackery, ignoring

its many thousands of years of safe, effective use on literally

billions of people, and overlooking its enormous knowledge base of

wisdom and experience in supporting balanced, holistic health.

 

Exotic systems / emerging systems: Many " undiscovered " systems of

natural medicine are slowly making their way to Western societies.

" Tibetan medicine " is beginning to gain momentum, partially thanks to

the outstanding work of the Dalai Lama and the accelerating movement

of Tibetan Buddhism in Western culture. Australian aborigines have

their own system of medicine, as do various native populations in the

South Pacific, Africa, and throughout many areas of South America

including Peru, Brazil and Argentina.

 

" Complementary medicine " is a term that defenders of conventional

medicine like to use to claim intellectual ownership over alternative

medicine. Complementary medicine means combining conventional

therapies with alternative therapies, but the alternative therapies

are almost always dismissed from being the primary treatments as they

are routinely relegated to supportive roles. For example,

complementary medicine's supporters might say that ginger is great for

reducing nausea following chemotherapy, but they would never say

ginger or garlic are anticancer herbs in their own right.

 

Promoters of " complementary medicine " are usually closet

drugs-and-surgery pushers who use this phrase to avoid appearing

totally out of touch with health trends. The complementary medicine

movement is largely an attempt by conventional medicine promoters to

prevent their harmful system of medicine from appearing completely

irrelevant as the public turns to safer, more effective and natural

alternatives. Conventional doctors refer to it as CAM, or

Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

 

" Alternative medicine " is a somewhat outdated term that refers to

everything outside the realm of conventional medicine. It's outdated

because alternative medicine is now mainstream medicine. Most people

use it, and the only reason more people don't is because

health-insurance refuses to cover most of the therapies in alternative

medicine. This term will probably fade away as the use of natural

healing therapies becomes even more popular with the general public.

 

Alternative medicine is often practiced with the limited mindset of

conventional medicine

 

" Integrative medicine " is a relatively recent term that typically

describes a more balanced, welcoming approach to using natural

therapies alongside conventional ones. While this system of medicine

still uses conventional medicine therapies such as drugs and

surgeries, it usually recommends them only as a last resort, instead

attempting to prevent or treat health conditions using natural

therapies first.

 

" Advanced medicine " refers to the future of medicine, based on

supporting the patient's health and wellness rather than attacking the

patient with various chemicals or procedures like radiation and

surgery. Advanced medicine is the first step to the new age of

understanding about the true underlying causes of health and wellness.

Advanced medicine makes conventional medicine and Western medicine

obsolete, and it includes therapies like phototherapy, sunlight,

nutrition, sound therapy, vibrational medicine, electromedicine,

mind-body medicine, energy healing, and other similar modalities that

were once considered experimental, but are now well-known to be both

safe and effective at supporting the health of the patient.

 

The term " junk science " is used by defenders of conventional medicine

to discredit everything outside conventional medicine, regardless of

whether or not it is based on sound scientific ground.

 

Similarly, the term " quackery " or " quack " is also used by the

defenders of conventional medicine to describe anything outside the

realm of conventional medicine. If it's not something they control,

own the intellectual rights to, or profit from, the defenders of

conventional medicine call it quackery, regardless of its merit as a

genuine healing therapy. The real quacks, though, are the old,

out-of-touch zealots of conventional medicine who can now best serve

humanity by either retiring or dying. Scientific revolutions, you see,

only happen when the defenders of old, outdated beliefs pass away,

creating space for the rise of new, more advanced ideas from younger

thinkers who don't have their careers and egos invested in old ways of

thinking. See the book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions to

learn more.

 

 

Link back to this article: http://www.NewsTarget.com/019365.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To your health,

- the Health Ranger

 

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chance to counter the tyranny of the FDA and finally make it

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the health benefits of their natural products. Take action:

 

http://www.citizens.

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