Alternative Medicine - General Overview

For several years it has seemed that conventional medicine no longer meets the population's needs or desires. The development of alternative practices is incontestable proof of this. Individuals have to pay heavily for leading a hectic life of consumerism, stress, pollution, poisoning, etc. Indeed, there has been an upsurge of allergies due to environmental factors; asthma is just one of the problems which now ravages children.

The body is also beginning to resist antibiotics. When the body is deprived of its natural defences, it no longer reacts to medicinal treatment and over the last ten years several "new" diseases have thus appeared (see course 113). If medicine does not provide all the answers to these unbalances, at least the subject has a range of complementary therapeutic techniques at his or her disposal to relieve and even cure symptoms.

The development of alternative practices is appealing because of their simplicity, efficacy and philosophy. Their global approach corresponds perfectly with the fact that today people do not entrust their health to doctors like they entrust their cars to mechanics. Now they want to take charge of themselves, recognize their individuality, and actively participate in their treatment or preventive health measures. More and more, health practitioners, specialists in the field of Alternative Medicine and researchers produce articles and clinical results which are the object of controlled studies. We believe that these efforts will lead to two significant results: on the one hand, the development of Naturopathy and naturotherapy professions to the benefit of the population; on the other hand, a better understanding of these therapies by a public which often feels helpless when faced with a mixture of practices which are sometimes not very reassuring.

Health and Health Practitioners

Other than in the case of an accident, after which various types of pain can ensue, all dysfunctions prepare themselves in our different "invisible" bodies long in advance before manifesting themselves "visibly". They are what needs to be treated because they are the source of the problem as well as its disappearance or the easing of it. Hippocrates, the greatest physician of antiquity, whose ethic was at the origin of the oath that doctors have taken since then, said that "all diseases are the consequences of our lifestyles". Thus, each element which makes up the daily life of a human being is linked to another: diet and exercise as well as living quarters, work, dealing with emotions, thought processes, spiritual beliefs and practices, etc. It was discovered that, when needed, the brain manufactures chemical substances in order to fight different types of illnesses. In other words, while the body is fighting off illness and sometimes wearing itself out to counter a dysfunction, the brain compensates for insufficiencies by secreting these substances.

Other than the physical body (the envelope), a human being is made up of an emotional body (the astral body), a mental body (the intellect and intuitive capacity) and a spiritual body (the soul, the interior guide and the higher self). Health is not only the absence of illness, but rather the balance between our four bodies. If we consider an illness as the body's inability to adapt to a situation, the attitude of the therapist and the patient depends on what we mean by "the natural defences giving up". In Naturopathy, if the body's defences are no longer working, it is because they were weakened by not following the rules which are meant to maintain them (healthy diet, vital hygiene, etc.). This concept does not reject traditional medicine in any way but allows the patient to learn a fundamental notion: health is an overall notion which much be considered as such, and the patient should be treated accordingly.

Through willpower, behaviour, hygiene and state of mind we contribute greatly to the smooth functioning of the body. As Doctor Schweitzer said, "The true physician is the interior physician". Most doctors do not consider this concept and yet it works so well. It is up to us to guide not just our bodies but our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual bodies to the best of our possibilities.

An unbalance will alter the functioning of one or several of these bodies. For instance, a nutritional imbalance indicates a pollution of the physical body; this alteration will intervene with the emotional body because of repressed emotions or urges which are not expressed or resolved. The same is true for both the mental body which suffers from negative images and thoughts, and finally, the spiritual body which dissociates itself from the supreme forces of the universe or God. For each of these four bodies there is an adapted therapy: conventional medicine for the first, psychiatry and its related disciplines for the mental and emotional, and finally, religion, occult sciences or turning to a guru or spiritual leader in order to take care of the spiritual body. Our different bodies defend themselves naturally from negative "attacks". The physical body does this through its immune defences, the emotional and mental bodies do this through psychological concentration techniques (yoga, sophrology, etc.) which are able to eliminate "mental toxins". The spiritual body leaves it to its "interior physician". Finally, the awareness of our bodies can be neutralized by drugs, uncontrolled fears or phobias, beliefs, and in the case of the spiritual body, by an occlusion or closed-minded attitude towards the rest of the universe.

The Role of Consciousness

Briefly, consciousness is our perception of what happens in ourselves. Whereas, by not reflecting upon or paying enough attention to our inner selves, a large part of this consciousness remains unexplored. This is what needs to be changed; we can only defend ourselves with the arms that we know how to use. Emotions and feelings are found in the emotional body. We can choose to ignore or reject them (for instance, when we refuse to cry), but we pay for this sooner or later. The mental body contains the acquired or innate values that we defend. If we blindly follow these "rules" because they were taught to us or imposed upon us, some of them can lead to an impasse and prevent us from freeing ourselves. At an early age, the idea of what is forbidden is instilled into us (not showing our emotions because of the long-standing belief that "a real man does not cry", etc.), which sometimes greatly pollutes our being and surfaces in adulthood as more or less serious psychological problems. And each time we forbid ourselves to express our emotions out of habit (and this goes for feelings of all types), we add to our frustrations and do more harm to our bodies. The fourth state, the spiritual body, is developed over time by reflection, meditation, the gradual elevation of the "self", and the internal quest. Along the way we must remember to attach well-deserved importance to our intuition.

The Health Practitioner's Position in Modern Medicine

The health practitioner offers to teach the rules of living by making the patient aware of his or her responsibilities concerning bodily deficiencies. Nature alone is capable of straightening out a situation, but only if we give it the means to do so. This involves an awareness of our individual and collective responsibility, and the study of the biological laws which we are subject to. In a word, this means that we must take charge of ourselves. The "active sick person" is the first one to bring about his or her recovery or to maintain his or her health. In this sense, Naturopathy is the perfect example of preventive medicine. Let us point out that we are not trying to prove that one system is superior to another, but rather that we are trying to show the different points of view in order to allow each person to make choices with a maximum amount of information. In traditional medicine, illnesses arise because of "natural deficiencies" which must be cured by scientific resources. In this case, the patient is hardly or not at all responsible. The sick person is subjected to the imperfections of his or her body. He or she is a victim. Science alone can straighten everything out thanks to medications or interventions which make up for the failing function. The "passive sick person" is subjected to medical authority. During a consultation, a doctor: "makes a diagnosis", i.e. determines as precisely as possible which illness a patient is suffering from, and suggests a treatment in order to cure the illness. This is the usual "consultation-prescription" pattern followed. A health practitioner will: perform a check-up, i.e. evaluate the state of the natural defences. In other words, he or she will assess the overall situation and the state of the different organs; explain the results of the exam to the patient. This is the first step in educating the patient, which will allow him or her to acquire better knowledge of his or her "reactive personality"; suggest basic education in Naturopathy by emphasizing individual adaptation according to the problems observed; possibly suggest a "general treatment" to help the natural functions take over once again.

This can be expressed as: " Consultation - Education - Reform". In the first case, the consultation (including possible laboratory work, radiology, etc.) is sufficient. The patient just follows the suggested treatment. In the second case, the consultation is only the starting point in an educational approach for the patient through different proposed activities. This is an essential point. After a vital hygiene consultation, "lasting" results will be assured: through an educational approach in view of changing habits which alone can modify the true causes of disturbances in the body; by being aware of the fact that the "natural treatments" suggested should be considered as assistance in accelerating the body's return to normal after reform.

Naturopathy does not consist in "prescribing natural remedies". Indeed, it is important for a treatment not to be toxic; a patient should not be exposed to risks which are greater than those involved in his or her illness. But there is another danger: the very significance given to the "remedy", whether it is synthetic or natural. In the consultation-prescription pattern mentioned above, the patient depends entirely upon the doctor whose knowledge becomes synonymous with power. This dependency on medical power keeps the patient in the position of someone who receives aid, and can nourish negative feelings of fear and anxiety. Modern work in psychology has shown how this mental attitude favours illness. As well, when Naturopathy succeeds where medicine has failed (generally in chronic states or functional disorders), it should not be concluded that the health practitioner is better than the doctor: the patient has become stronger than his or her illness. Therefore, we can say that the patient has "freed" him or herself from the illness, and that the health practitioner has played the role of guide. The idea is not a novel one, since Hippocrates wrote long ago that "a sick person finds in himself his first therapy, which is the wisest, most faithful and most effective, for it is the therapy which is born in him".