Thoughts on alternative medicine

There has been a lot of debate recently about the use of alternative or complimentary therapies such as accupunture, homeopathy, reflexology, crystal healing, even chiropracty, and whether these have a positive or negative effect on health. There are a couple of distinct arguments around the subject and it is an interesting topic to debate I think, as it draws in ideas of ethics, psychology and pathology, and creates thoughts around how we as a society and as individuals perceive health and wellness. To begin, there is an arguement that in general, we, as a society are becoming more focused on our personal health, and that potentially this is leading us as individuals to become more selfish in terms of our demands on healthcare professionals. There has been a dramatic increase in the rates of diagnosis of a range of medical conditions which broadly fall into a category of having a unknown cause. These are conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome, chronic fatique syndrome, fibro-myalgia, chronic pain syndrome and the like. What makes all of these conditions similar is that they are diagnosed by exclusion. That is, doctors act to rule out other possible medical conditions that have known causes and can be treated, and having ruled those out, conclude that the symptoms in essence have an unknown cause.

This causes problems for the mainstream medical profession since if the cause of symptoms is unknown, treatment of the underlying condition is impossible. All doctors can do is try to treat the symptoms and hope that through alleviation the condition will improve. It also causes problems for the patient in that without a clear cause and treatment it is difficult to convince people that there is anything really wrong. From the point of view of the general public there can be a feeling that people suffering from these conditions are malingering and that there is nothing really wrong with them. This can create a sense of desperation in the patient in that the patient can become willing to try anything to ease their condition. Consequently it is a fertile ground for alternative treatments.

Concurrent with this is a prevelent idea that many of these conditions are neurologically created, either in a psychosomatic way, or as a consequence of psychological stress. The mechanisms of the mind in dealing with stress are not fully understood, so it is at least possible that changes in neurological, and more specifically neurochemical conditions can manifest as physical ailments. Having experienced extreme stress personally I can attest to thephysical manifestations of neuro-chemical imbalances, but if neurological changes are a contributing factor in these conditions, could these not be tested for? Cost is clearly an issue, since the testing procedure would involve FMRI scanning of the brain which is not easy or cheap to organise given the prevalence of these conditions. It also, if we accept a psychological component, opens the door for alternative therapies to actually be of benefit since they may work quite effectively at a psychological level.

There has been some evidence that GP's who take longer to talk to patients, and who are perceived to take patients seriously tend to have a better success rate in terms of alieviating symptoms than those GP's who appear to lack time, empathy and genuine concern. It could well be the case that in certain specific areas, the use of complimentary healthcare could give measurable benefits, based on the attention given to the patient by the practitioner, even if the therapy itself is limited in its practical funtionality. My personal opinion is that much more research is equired into the whole field, and that, if nothing else, taking a more holistic approach to patient well being would provide long term health benefits.