New Medicine
Dr. Rachel Remen, author, faculty member of
the University of California at San Francisco Medical School, co-founder
of Commonweal, and recipient of a 2007 Bravewell Leadership award
has often made statements regarding the direction that medicine
should initiate to bring healing. “Healing
may not be so much about getting better as about letting go of everything
that isn’t you – all of the expectations, all of the
beliefs – and becoming who you are,” is one of her emphatic
statements. She has kindled awareness that medical practitioners
should position themselves more in the healing realm
than in the curing arena. Our expectations
of medicine and Doctors has been to “fix” what is broken
much like repairing a car, rather than assisting people to accept
who they are with their deficiencies while emphasizing and developing
their strengths. In the documentary, “The New Medicine”,
broadcast on PBS to millions of viewers, Dr. Remen reminisced back
when she was 15 years old about her own diagnosis of Crohn’s
Disease. No one in the medical field emphasized for her that
she could still live a meaningful life even though it would be riddled
with interruptions to attend to the physical malady.
More frequently
today people are searching for compassionate professionals who want
to collaborate and listen carefully to not only the physical malfunctions
but the emotional and psychological ramifications that accompany
the deteriorating or dis-eased physical body. The
aim of complementary and integrative therapies is to focus on patient
involvement in the healing process while addressing the whole person,
body, mind, and spirit. We need the direction of the trained
and learned but we should assume responsibility for our own health. Significant
positive results occur by allowing the patient to be an active partner
in the healing procedures rather than merely a witness of some agent
or person acting upon the individual.
Recently (for the last decade
or two) there has been evolving a new
medicine. In 1996 Dr. James C. Gordon wrote a book, “Manifesto
for a New Medicine”. This trend toward a new medicine has
been taking root and there are doctors, nurses, clinics, and hospitals
that are embracing these more human efforts at healing the person,
rather than merely wiping out symptoms. The new medicine also
accents the importance of preventive care and regaining optimal health
prior to some breakdown in the physical. A blended report was
made by Dr. Andrew Weil, Director of the Program in Integrative Medicine
at University of Arizona Medical School and Dr. Ralph Snyderman,
Chancellor for Health Affairs, Duke University Medical Center which
in summary stated, “It is our belief and recommendation that
Integrative Medicine be a cornerstone of the urgently needed reconfiguration
of our increasingly dysfunctional system of healthcare. The
Integrative Medicine of today will simply be the medicine of the
new century.”
The definition of this new or integrative
medicine can be
found in Dr. Gordon’s first book. He states: “The
new medicine fosters an optimistic and hopeful attitude toward the
experience of illness. It is based on a therapeutic relationship
that is more egalitarian than authoritarian. And it creates
a new synthesis of ancient and modern, conventional and unconventional
techniques, the best of modern science and the most enduring aspects
of perennial medical wisdom…..We need to ensure that this
new synthesis that we are jointly creating is available to everyone.”
Kenkou’s
mission is to inform the public to consider this type of health care
and to foster possibilities for medical professionals to adopt this new
medicine as a modality for themselves
here in San Antonio and not just in distant clinics and offices in
other parts of the country. |
