Integrated Medicine

Last Friday, I got a good surprise from being a couch potato. On the popular Dr. Oz’s television show, I was hearing the good doctor telling his many enthusiastic audiences benefits of three herbal teas. I remember not long ago doctors practicing western medicine would have nothing to do with the alternative medical treatments. Therefore, I was so taken aback when hearing an allopathic practitioner goes public on what sage, nettle and one African tea can do for us. What I saw on Dr.Oz's show suggests to me that the less invasive alternative medicine is no longer a taboo to allopathic doctors.

We all know the science-based allopathic medicine is indispensable in health cares. Penicillin has saved many patients from infection. Cardiac surgery has mended millions of broken hearts. Organ transplants are now common practices.

And we have also learned there are other ways to cure diseases. Some doctors prescribed high dosages of vitamins to cure mental illness. Others used acupuncture needles to manage their patient’s physical pain. It is no wonder that a new industry, nutraceutical, has emerged in the alternative health care regime. The manufacturers of nutraceuticals add healing foods into their products. Even in veterinarian cares, we can now obtain naturopathic therapies for our four-leg friends.

And I think it is a good thing that more alternative health treatments are becoming accetable therapies to the allopathic practitioners. Although the alternative ones are based on anecdotes, many of its regimes were put in use for years before the western medicine did. - Ayee