Over 25 years ago, the National Institute of Health stated that by the year 2020, medicine would work hand in hand with practically ALL evidence-based disciplines that deal with our health (nutrition, public health, acupuncture, etc.) Last December, the World Health Organization (WHO) made it official: Integrative Medicine is now mainstream, as long as it is based in solid scientific evidence. Let us hope insurance companies expand their coverage accordingly, if they are to continue ruling health care, but that is a cat from another bag.
References
2020 Vision, Journal of the American Medical Association 1999;282:2287.
“As a result of rigorous scientific investigation, several therapeutic and preventive modalities currently deemed elements of complementary and alternative medicine will have proven effective. Therefore, by 2020, these interventions will have been incorporated into conventional medical education and practice, and the term “complementary and alternative medicine” will be superseded by the concept of “Integrative Medicine.”
Bridging the divide between health and health care, JAMA 2013;309:1121
“Health Care delivery accounts for only 10% of preventable deaths, with the remainder attributable to personal behaviors, social and environmental determinants, and genetic predispositions. As currently constituted the health care delivery system has little direct control over these other factors. However, consensus is developing that truly controlling health care costs and improving the overall health of Americans will require a much closer partnership, permeable boundaries, and increased interdependence among the health care delivery system, the public sector, and the community development and social service sectors… To create a culture of health will require creating a market for health, moving away from the current market for treating disease.”
“There is no place for dogma in science. The scientist is free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion, to seek for any evidence, to correct any error. Where Science has been used in the past to erect a new dogmatism, that dogmatism has found itself incompatible with the progress of science; and in the end the dogma has yielded, or Science and Freedom have perished altogether.” Oppenheimer
