Dear Subscriber,
Dr. Dan Kenner below explains the difference between “Medicine” and “Healing”. I prefer the terms “Drugging” and “Healing”. I was in shock late in my 3rd year of medical school seeing how patients were simply chemicalized and for life, usually. I thought I was going to learn healing. I did not. And, for that reason, have found it very difficult to contribute to my alma matter knowing it is funded by the Pharma or Drug Cartel. I’m sure you know that I consider ozone and similar therapies to be superior to most all others in that they actually stimulate your body to heal.
Please enjoy today’s wisdom from Dr. Kenner.
RJR
MEDICINE AND HEALING
Medical Science and Healing Science are not the same thing. When I worked at Kaiser as an acupuncturist in the chronic pain program, I attended one of the patient orientations. The patients were told that “we can’t cure your chronic pain, but treatment can help you cope with it better.” I had to speak up. As a health care provider, I had to point out that our paradigm in corrective, not palliative, and that all of the alternative practitioners will attempt to get rid of your pain and suffering.
Medicine puts you on pain killers for the rest of your life. Medicine puts you on antihypertensives for your blood pressure for the rest of your life. Medicine puts you on statins for the rest of your life. Is that what you want? But medicine is an important part of healing science with advanced emergency medicine, surgery and medical imaging. For chronic disease Healing Science is necessary.
A French medical doctor named David Servan-Schreiber went to do volunteer work in India at Dharamsala, where they had a very up-to-date modern hospital. One of his patients was getting treatment from a traditional Ayurvedic practitioner. Dr. Servan-Schreiber was more curious than judgmental and asked why, with all of this state-of-the-art medical technology, drugs and scientific medicine, would he choose an ancient form of medicine that is surely obsolete and misguided? The patient replied that if he required an appendectomy or a traumatic injury, he would surely come to the modern hospital without hesitation, but for a chronic health problem, modern medicine offers nothing. For chronic illness it is necessary to undergo individualized treatment according to your constitutional type using nontoxic and immune-building herbs and foods. When Dr. Servan-Schreiber contracted cancer, he opened his mind further and became an expert on the lifestyle of cancer prevention and treatment. The Dalai Lama himself also stated in an interview that modern medicine is for crisis management and that Ayurveda is a healing paradigm.
The only way to treat chronic disease is Healing Science. Healing Science uses lifestyle change, supplements, i.v.s ozone, hyperthermia, hands-on treatments like chiropractic, bodywork and acupuncture.
Another perspective on the role of industrial medicine in the context of Healing Science comes from China where Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) examines the potential benefits of the Western approach:
CHINA GIVES LIMITED APPROVAL TO WESTERN MEDICINE
At the conclusion of a 3-day meeting in the Great Hall of the People, an elite panel of 12 Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) practitioners declared that Western Medicine “showed definite promise as adjunctive treatment to TCM.” As a stand-alone medicine, however, the panel found that its effectiveness was mainly in the area of catastrophic conditions that comprise a relatively small percentage of total patient complaints.
Professor Tan Shien-Xu, the panel chair and director of the Integrative Medicine Institute of the Beijing Friendship Hospital, stated, “There is sufficient evidence of Western Medicine’s effectiveness to encourage further studies of its physiology and clinical value.” He especially stressed the evidence that western anesthetics appear to enhance the effectiveness of acupuncture analgesia and that CT scans are useful for determining which stroke patients are likely to benefit from acupuncture therapy.
The consensus report of the panel was particularly critical of biomedical research, since the major means by which Western Medicine was examined during the 3-day meeting was of clinical trials. Key points of the critique were:
· The conditions chosen for study are, too often, imprecise collections of symptoms which lump together distinctly different conditions that are readily distinguishable by TCM.
· The trials are designed to determine the mean response, an outcome that is usually of limited value to a practitioner who must devise treatments suitable for individual patients.
· Trials test one drug at a time, an approach that is bound to reveal a range of unwanted side effects, unlike TCM that is constantly seeking the correct combinations of herbs to balance out any adverse effects from individual herbs.
“It is also our impression,” Professor Tan quoted from the report, “that Western Medicine is based in a belief system that is powerfully reinforced by the large sums of money that patients and insurance companies are willing to pay for treatment.”
“We strongly recommend,” the report concluded, “that patients should be treated with Western Medicine only on a referral basis from a practitioner of TCM.”
TCM uses a whole-system model and reductionist “Western Medicine” could be considered a subset of TCM devoted to emergency care from this perspective.
Here is a breakdown of some of the differences between Medicine and Healing:
MEDICINE AND HEALING
MEDICINE
Hierarchic/interventionist
Responsibility belongs to the doctor
Symptoms are undesirable
Disease is an entity, with a specific name and characteristics
Disease has a single cause and a single solution
Subjective complaints often dismissed
Placebo factor trivialized
Linear, quantitative
Anatomy-based; disease is a local phenomenon; requires specialization
Body requires correction, needs scientific know-how
Belief in Entropy: Process of Life is like a machine running down
HEALING
Egalitarian/noninterventionist
Responsibility belongs to the patient
Symptoms are not always undesirable
Disease is a process, a series of conditions unique to each person
Disease has multiple causes and multiple solutions
Subjective complaints central
Placebo factor maximized
Global, qualitative
Physiology-based, disease is functional and systemic
Body self-correcting, has innate higher intelligence
Belief in Entelechy: Life process is self-manifesting and self-regenerating
You don’t hear much about Healing Science in any of the media. Healers don’t get much visibility or coverage in newspapers, television, or the like. If there is a policy change in medical care in the political arena, the experts are interviewed. Have you ever heard a quote or interview from a healer? Our perspective is ignored. There are whole professions devoted to healing: naturopaths, chiropractors, acupuncturists, lifestyle coaches, and a few osteopaths and M.D.s
Any community with even one holistic physician is lucky. It’s a very difficult profession; in many cases they face opposition, disparagement and even ridicule from their colleagues and bureaucrats, as if it wasn’t difficult enough to treat
Patients, who often have difficult health challenges, with a skilled and individualized approach.
Dr. Dan
Beautifully written Dr Rowen. Thorough, and objective. Another modality folks may want to include in their quiver, is Healing is Voltage, Dr Jerry Tennant.