Quite frequently I encounter people who shy away from the term alternative medicine. They usually prefer the term complementary medicine, as though that were more politically, even if not technically, correct.
I’m sorry, but I can’t agree with this practice at all. It masks important concepts and may mislead people who are making choices about approaches to treatment. Such choices may have far reaching and even life and death consequences, so let’s not confuse and befuddle them.
One might ask, alternative or complementary to what? That’s a sensible question actually. The answer is to orthodox or regular medicine, which is based upon the medical-biological model and can be described as western, scientific and allopathic. This is the approach that favors the pharmaceutical companies’ potent chemical concoctions, with their nasty and ultimately unavoidable side effects and countless related deaths and worsened pathologies.
Yes, they definitely achieve some good, there is no doubt about that. However, they do it at the price of considerably more harm than most people feel comfortable acknowledging. Indeed, someone advised me not to post material such as this as it could upset the drug companies!
There are many reasons why people don’t feel comfortable talking about the harm caused by drug companies and the doctors who are their pushers. One might be the desire not to undermine the usefulness and safety of the drugs in people’s minds (which sounds to me like fear the truth will get out). Another might be to avoid the backlash from the acutely sensitive drug companies. Fortunately, I don’t scare easily.
So, to return to my point, what is complementary to this form of medical practice? The answer is anything that supports or agrees with the underlying model (including its philosophical base) and which can operate fully in conjunction with ongoing orthodox medical treatment. If the other systems’ models (or underlying philosophies) or treatments conflict with or are hampered or rendered useless by the orthodox treatments then they cannot be considered complementary.
This means that very few are actually complementary. They may actually be used together and may both actually be of benefit, but if they conflict as discribed above they cannot be termed complementary.
Orthodox medicine has ascended to a position of dominance in western society. It surrounds itself with associated and allied health disciplines, such as nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, podiatry, and so on. None of these represent a threat to medicine because they fundamentally subscribe to the same medical-biological model and cannot offer a replacement (or alternative) for orthodox medical treatment. They are indeed complementary health disciplines.
Alternative medicine systems do exist however and some predate orthodox medicine by thousands of years. Their track records are longer and in many ways, much better. However, I won’t tackle the myth of orthodoxy’s superiority in this post, that must wait for another time.
Eastern systems such as Chinese medicine and Ayurvedic medicine are obvious examples. In addition, newer systems such as chiropractic and osteopathic medicine also reflect divergent underlying medical philosophies from that of allopathic medicine. Homeopathic and herbal medicine are also alternative systems of medicine. There are several others.
Unfortunately, many people who practise alternative medicine of one or more varities are inadequately educated in the underlying philospohies of their chosen fields of practise. This results in them not quite grasping the importance of their alternative perspective. Sometimes, when they do indeed grasp the distinctions well enough, they downplay them deliberately, for a variety of reasons.
I will leave this here for now. There is much more to be said however.