Dr.Needles.com
Successful aging requires health of: mind,body, and spirit
MEDICAL ALTERNATIVES
We must be flexible on choosing what is good and what is bad. Different approaches are endorsed by some, and condemned by others. The question is: How do you get honest and true information? There is a middle ground to all this and we must try to seek it.
Millions of educated Americans are seeking alternative medical treatment. They are supplements or are abandoning prescribed medical treatments. Despite medicine's great progress, many question remain unsolved in patient health care.
We are living longer because of advances, in antibiotics, and Western Medicine surgery, but most of us find we also are suffering longer now from degenerative diseases that cripple us.
We have not stopped arteries from clotting, and rarely have we prevented or cured cancer, arthritis, Parkinsonism, Alzheimer’s, Aids emphysema, cataracts, kidney and liver failure and even the common migraine headache.
Doctors are reluctant to accept new approaches.
Many encourage patients to abandon treatments with previous good track records. Most patients want to prevent diseases before they lead us to chronic disabilities.
Society has narrowed the gap between the West and the East, as we appreciate new findings in the brain function and the immune system. There is now a better understanding of alternative medicine and rational approaches are now being taken.
Alternative medicine is here to stay. In chronic pain treatment, many treatments are available as hypnosis, meditation, prayer, special diets, and especially acupuncture. Teas are mentioned for insomnia as well as sleeping pills. Discussions about chelation, ginseng ginkgo biloba, and chondroitin, are taking place.
Even the NIH (the caretaker of western medicine) is spending 23 million dollars a year in research work on such alternative treatments. Insurance companies are now reimbursing policyholders for wellness plans and alternative medicines, but not for acupuncture.
We must be flexible on choosing what is good and what is bad. Doctors say they are holistic. So was the country doctor 50 years ago. The mind and body go together. Prevention of disease is important. You the patient must insist on it. Today’s specialists that treat only one organ, must consider the whole patient.
We also must do our part in considering how we shall live and how the style of our living effects on our bodies. We must see the dangers of smoking and drinking and the effects of moods, stresses, foods we eat, and the lack of exercising on our bodies.
Different approaches are endorsed by some, and condemned by others. The question is: How do you get honest and true information?
There is a middle ground to all this and we must try to seek it. We must sift out the garbage and find answers to our questions on disease treatments. Journals of western medicine never allow reports stating the results of alternative therapies.
Acupuncture has passed centuries of human experiences, yet claims are made that it is not scientifically tested according to western protocol. Yet western medicine is always changing its mind. Treatments of 10 years ago are now abandoned because they were found harmful.
Traditional doctors often make statements that are not based on sound hard evidence. These statements are based on belief instead of observed biochemical reactions in the body. How do you measure Qi energy? Clinical observations prove that acupuncture treatments work and have been used for thousands of years.
Suppose you have local back pain and have treatment with acupuncture, Chinese herbs, Vitamin E, antibiotics, massage, steroid injections and even prayer. When your back pain is gone, what worked? Try to explain the mechanism of how these modalities worked.
Oriental medicine is not scientific as it is practiced. It is not dependant on medical science. Research is needed to validate the effectiveness and mechanism of acupuncture and herbal medicine.
Oriental medicine is extremely old and time tested. There are specific energetic patterns to guide its practice. Only pain control has been scientifically proven by western medicine.
The Oriental treatments for disease and injury are radically different from western medicine. It works by manipulating and enhancing Qi and blood. People can't wait for scientific validation by blind studies.