What You Should Know About Alternative Therapies!
In each of the past 2 years, Americans have made more visits to alternative health practitioners than to traditional medical providers.
In a 1999 study, it was reported that almost two-thirds of patients seen by rheumatologists have used an alternative therapy. Why is that? For one, we’re disenchanted with medicine as it exists today. Technology, while helpful, is impersonal. Our bodies may be treated but at the expense of our souls. When we go to a physician we are seen as a disease—not as a person. A specialist’s visit is worse. There, we are a specific body part. Too many times the treatment sum of our body parts doesn’t make us whole. We want to help ourselves without popping another pharmaceutical. We want the natural and the personal… not the chemical and “impersonal.” Alternative therapies give us a sense of control and self-direction, something that is missing with many of our current therapies. Nowhere is this truer than in the management of arthritis. We want the pain to go away… but we don’t want side-effects. We don’t want the disease to cripple us… yet, we want to do something for ourselves. The power of the mind to heal is evident in many of the double-blind controlled studies in arthritis. Patients receiving placebo can have a 40 per cent response rate! Some doctors scoff at this “placebo response.” Wrong attitude! We should be trying to figure out why this placebo response happens and use it to help people. This section is dedicated to presenting information on alternative therapies. A few words of advice: First, make sure you tell your physician everything you are taking; second, let your doctor know if you’re seeing an alternative health specialist; third, talk with your doctor about the therapy you’re trying; fourth, ask for a prescription… sometimes insurance will help cover it. This section is divided into brief discussions on multiple aspects of alternative medicine. It is not as complete as the discussion in my book, “How You Can Beat Arthritis Just Like I Did... By an Arthritis Specialist” But it will certainly do as a start...
|
