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Medical Models; Medical Practice; Medical Research
Barbara Ruth Campbell (CAMPBELL@ZODIAC.BITNET)
Fri, 22 Jul 1994 14:04:45 -0400
Anj Petto's post (July 22) adds to a question my mother asked me
yesterday:
What's the difference between holistic medicine, all these models
you keep talking about, the way medicine is practiced in the
physician's office (she had just been kept waiting 45 minutes for
her appointment) and medical science - or whatever it is that
we have piled up on the dining room table?
David Eisenberg (the primary author of the constantly cited Jan. 1993
New England Journal of Medicine and the author of Encounters with QI:
Exploring Chinese Medicine - an account of his year of training at
the Beijing Institute of Traditional Medicine) discusses
(sort of like Castaneda's style of writing) his conversations with
his teachers at the institute trying to comprehend the Chinese
philosophy underlying the medical model. On the other hand he
also describes the hospitals the not too warm and friendly diagnoses,
the horribly long waiting room lines and factory like approach to
medical treatment as a whole that he witnessed and participated in
as a resident.
So, I'm trying to extract "postulates" = there is yin and yang -
can't prove it but it's accepted as a given; "theoretical assumptions"
or "basic philosophy" of what is health and how is it maintained,
from etiologic agents - this could range from e. coli bacteria to
a witches curse all the way through the continuum to how medicine
is actually dispensed - and that includes the diagnosis, treatment
and follow-up.
Any insights?
Thanks.
Barbara
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