An Economy In Need Of Holistic Medicine

nytimes.com:

Western medical practices have attracted similar criticisms in recent years, for an emphasis on intervening in disease rather than preventing it beforehand and promoting quotidian well-being.

Read the whole story: nytimes.com

Comments

[bmonaghan]

In theory, using herbal remedies to help with various ailments does work. The fact is, most medicinal herbs have been evaluated and studied, and there is reams of data on the efficacy of herbal medicines. The problem is most supplements contain junk herbs with little potency and seldom in the dosage that the studies were done at. The University of Notre Dame did a study that showed 30% of all herbal products were either toxic or contained heavy metals. (See link). The other issue is how those herbs are activated. If you are just swallowing herb dust, it will do nothing for you. You have to activate the medicinal properties of the herb in a tea or a tincture. I suggest buying your herbs from a real herbal apothecary like http://www.homegrownherbandtea.com

http://www.prlog.org/10254135-popular-herbal-supplements-found-to-contain-deadly-toxins-study-finds.html

[euthman]

Yes, this is what happens when a pharmaceutical industry is completely unregulated. Look at the problems that have occurred with _regulated_ pharmaceuticals. Supplements have zero regulation. Obviously, if there are no rules to mandate that a manufacturer show safety or effectiveness, people are going to sell us all sorts of bogus products.

[vippy]

I go along with that. Prevention is the key! You are what you eat and then the lifestyle, of course.
If it was me I would outlaw sodas and chips and cookies, hydrogenated vegetable oil. But then people believe if they take a pill (medicine) it cures it all but makes it actually worse with all the side effects, say liver and kidneys!

[euthman]

Summarizing holistic medicine/wellness/alternative medicine:

1) The legitimate recommendations (watch your weight, eat your vegetables, get plenty of exercise) are things everyone already knows.

2) The other recommendations (supplements, detoxification, specific foods) have no basis in empirical science.

For those who don't care about scientific proof that something works, why not just go to a faith healer rather than spending money on supplements and alt med practitioners? For maximum placebo effect, all you need is belief!

[jwander1]

Try looking up the evidence on supplements, foods, and other alternatives for once before spouting your ignorant opinions. You simply don't know what you're talking about, and you're apparently proud of that fact as well. There's plenty of research on the efficacy of specific nutrients for treating illness. Too bad there's no cure for being pathologically dense, because you could use a heavy dose.

[euthman]

Yes, you keep saying that, but you offer no evidence that any supplement is effective at preventing or treating any disease. The Nat'l Center of Complementary and Alternative Medicine has spent a half-billion dollars over ten years to show that the only supplement that is useful for anything is ginger extract for treating chemotherapy-induced nausea.

Vitamin D _may_ be beneficial, so I do take that, even though much more needs to be done to determine if the vitamin D deficiency itself is important, or if it is just a marker for some other problem. Women with risk for osteopenia may benefit for calcium supplementation, but that's it. Everything else is just people making things up out of thin air and presenting it as if it has been substantiated, which it most certainly hasn't.

[timezone]

I've wished for holistic medicine for a long time. There are so many specialists that one must see now days to get an idea about what's happening and often they each want to prescribe a totally different med or have a different diagnosis looking at the same tests! Often doctors don't look at the whole person and keeping the whole person well. We're treated as symptoms, not people.

[goodnews7]

Our Government Run Health Services - Part 3 - Medicaid
Medicaid is a means tested government health program for eligible people with low incomes and resources. Medicaid is jointly funded by the federal and state governments. It goes by a different name in some states, such as Medi-Cal in California. The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency within the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), monitors the state-run programs. It establishes requirements for eligibility and oversees funding, service delivery and quality. In this article we’ll look at its background, strengths and [...]
http://silverbuzzcafe.com/?p=4358