Complementary And Alternative Medicine Breakthroughs In Research And Practice

"This book is a critical reference source of the latest research findings on the application of complementary and alternative medicine in the prevention, treatment, and cures for numerous diseases. Highlighting a range of pertinent topics such as herbal remedies, antioxidants, and functional foods"--

Integration of complementary and alternative medicine therapies (CAM) with conventional medicine is occurring in hospitals and physicians offices, health maintenance organizations (HMOs) are covering CAM therapies, insurance coverage for CAM is increasing, and integrative medicine centers and clinics are being established, many with close ties to medical schools and teaching hospitals. In determining what care to provide, the goal should be comprehensive care that uses the best scientific evidence available regarding benefits and harm, encourages a focus on healing, recognizes the importance of compassion and caring, emphasizes the centrality of relationship-based care, encourages patients to share in decision making about therapeutic options, and promotes choices in care that can include complementary therapies where appropriate. Numerous approaches to delivering integrative medicine have evolved. Complementary and Alternative Medicine in the United States identifies an urgent need for health systems research that focuses on identifying the elements of these models, the outcomes of care delivered in these models, and whether these models are cost-effective when compared to conventional practice settings. It outlines areas of research in convention and CAM therapies, ways of integrating these therapies, development of curriculum that provides further education to health professionals, and an amendment of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act to improve quality, accurate labeling, research into use of supplements, incentives for privately funded research into their efficacy, and consumer protection against all potential hazards.

This book examines how complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) – as knowledge, philosophy and practice – is constituted by, and transformed through, broader social developments. Shifting the sociological focus away from CAM as a stable entity that elicits perceptions and experiences, chapters explore the forms that CAM takes in different settings, how global social transformations elicit varieties of CAM, and how CAM philosophies and practices are co-produced in the context of social change. Through engagement with frameworks from Science and Technology Studies (STS), CAM is reconceptualised as a set of practices and knowledge-making processes, and opened up to new forms of analysis. Part 1 of the book explores how and why boundaries within CAM and between CAM and other health practices, are being constructed, challenged and changed. Part 2 asks how CAM as material practice is shaped by politics and regulation in a range of national settings. Part 3 examines how evidence is being produced and used in CAM research and practice. Including studies of CAM in Eastern and Western Europe, Asia, and North and South America, the volume will appeal to postgraduate students, researchers and health practitioners.

The use of complementary therapies is exploding, increasing the pressure to establish a rigorous science to support its practice. Clinical Research in Complementary Therapies: Principles, Problems and Solutions provides students with the tools they need to research complementary and integrative medicine (CIM) and so fill this gap. Essential for both undergraduate and postgraduate students, this second edition is significantly updated and enhanced. Part 1 deals with research strategies and methods, explaining the major types of clinical research in CIM and how these inter-relate. New chapters are included on whole systems research, qualitative research and questionnaire development. Not all therapies can be treated the same way nor channeled through the signal process of randomized controlled trials. Therefore, detailed description of mixed methods approaches including observational, qualitative, cost-benefit and comparative effectiveness research are described. Part 2 deals with specific complementary therapies and how they are invested by experts in each field. The book analyses the key questions asked and the controversies debated in complementary medicine research and offers clear and innovative guidance for answering these questions. FEATURES • Provides an overarching synthesis of methods in CIM and how they are to be used collectively including the role of comparative effectiveness research • Suggests both general and specific factors which need to be considered in assessing or planning complementary therapy research • Pinpoints aspects of research which are different in orthodox research and complementary therapy research • Reviews the types of research carried out in specific complementary therapies and analyses issues which arise • Includes information on measuring the economic cost and benefits of complementary medicine, clinical audit and the role of placebos use • Builds upon recent research results, looks at the lessons these provide for all complementary therapies and suggests key issues to address in future research. • Provides an overarching synthesis of methods in CIM and how they are to be used collectively including the role of comparative effectiveness research • Suggests both general and specific factors which need to be considered in assessing or planning complementary therapy research • Pinpoints aspects of research which are different in orthodox research and complementary therapy research • Reviews the types of research carried out in specific complementary therapies and analyses issues which arise • Includes information on measuring the economic cost and benefits of complementary medicine, clinical audit and the role of placebos use • Builds upon recent research results, looks at the lessons these provide for all complementary therapies and suggests key issues to address in future research.

Issues in Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research and Practice: 2013 Edition is a ScholarlyEditions™ book that delivers timely, authoritative, and comprehensive information about Acupuncture and Meridian Studies. The editors have built Issues in Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research and Practice: 2013 Edition on the vast information databases of ScholarlyNews.™ You can expect the information about Acupuncture and Meridian Studies in this book to be deeper than what you can access anywhere else, as well as consistently reliable, authoritative, informed, and relevant. The content of Issues in Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research and Practice: 2013 Edition has been produced by the world’s leading scientists, engineers, analysts, research institutions, and companies. All of the content is from peer-reviewed sources, and all of it is written, assembled, and edited by the editors at ScholarlyEditions™ and available exclusively from us. You now have a source you can cite with authority, confidence, and credibility. More information is available at http://www.ScholarlyEditions.com/.

Based on careful analysis of burden of disease and the costs ofinterventions, this second edition of 'Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries, 2nd edition' highlights achievable priorities; measures progresstoward providing efficient, equitable care; promotes cost-effectiveinterventions to targeted populations; and encourages integrated effortsto optimize health. Nearly 500 experts - scientists, epidemiologists, health economists,academicians, and public health practitioners - from around the worldcontributed to the data sources and methodologies, and identifiedchallenges and priorities, resulting in this integrated, comprehensivereference volume on the state of health in developing countries.

Complementary and integrative medicine (CIM) has become big business. Alongside the increased consumption of complementary medicine and the swelling numbers of complementary health practitioners has emerged a growing interest in these medicines and therapies from within the ranks of conventional primary health care. At the level of practice and beyond, a culture of confrontation and antagonism has begun to be replaced by a focus upon potential integration, collaboration and common ground.With these significant developments in mind, this ground-breaking book is a valuable and timely addition to the CIM and primary health care research literature. The collection outlines the core issues, challenges and opportunities facing the CIMOCoprimary health care interface and its study and will provide insight and inspiration for those practising, studying and researching the contemporary relations between CIM and primary health care.The book is the first to be authored by leading international CIMOCoprimary health care researchers from diverse disciplines and backgrounds, including health social science, statistics, qualitative methodology, general practice, clinical trials design, clinical pharmacology, health services research and public health. All contributors are active CIMOCoprimary health care researchers and their extensive research and practice experience helps lend a unique immediacy and richness to the contributions and collection.