Comments on NCCAM's Transition: Mindbody Pioneer Achterberg, AOM Student and an Anonymous Researcher
Written by John Weeks
3 Voices on NCCAM's Transition: Mind-body Pioneer Achterberg, AOM Student and Anonymous Academic Researcher
Summary: Here are three additional comments on Integrator
dialogue on the selection of the new NCCAM director, Josephine Briggs,
MD: mind-body pioneer Jeannie Achterberg, PhD, shares some professional
frustration with NCCAM priorities; acupuncture and Oriental medicine
student Natalie Schwehr takes me to task for polarizing the discussion;
and an anonymous academic medicine-based researcher opines on the
wisdom of commenting fully about differences with the status quo since
securing NCCAM funds is the anchor for the career. Briggs is actively educating herself. But will those with whom she interviews speak freely, and with deep connection to the clinicians in the field?
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Jeannie Achterberg, PhD, mindbody research pioneer
1. Mind-body Research Pioneer Achterberg: "Integrative medicine must be interdisciplinary medicine"
Jeannie Achterberg, PhD,
a pioneer in mind-body medicine research, sent me a personal note with
a request to not publish. I got back to her and said that hers is a
voice that needs to be heard. Achterberg, whose professional involvements includes work with the Kokolulu Cancer Retreats on Hawaii's Big Island, consented.
"John, just a 'thank you' for your recent blog. I just want to support you and vent.
"I, for one, have
been appalled for years at the confiscation of so-called integrative medicine
by MDs, most of whom just leapt upon a bandwagon and act as if they discovered the field. You and I both know of physicians, like Larry Dossey[MD] who have generously and
graciously fostered the birth and growth of this work, and view it as a
multidisciplinary endeavor.
"Many of us non-physicians who have been in the trenches most of our
natural lives, teaching, doing research and clinical work, are simply
ignored or thrown a bone of acknowledgment now and then. I developed a
mind/body PhD curriculum almost 20 years ago in a psychology program
(in a regionally accredited, free standing, experimental school--where
else would this have been permitted?) and have witnessed the
graduation of many students who are now competent and productive
professionals. A few had MD degrees prior to entering the program.
When I asked [former director Stephen] Straus about funding and
scholarships for my students, he replied that it would not be possible.
CAM was about medical and nursing education, he said.
"I gave up. The field will flourish only if integrative
medicine becomes interdisciplinary medicine.
"Regarding the appointment of Josephine Briggs as director
of the NCCAM, your metaphor of colonialism is problematic and misses a few
decades of scholarship and nuanced critical perspective. Suggesting a simplistic
dichotomy between 'us' versus the 'overlord' creates
unnecessary contentiousness and alienation, flattens diversity and difference,
and inhibits potential understanding and mutual interest.
Natalie Schwehr, AOM student Northwestern Health Sciences University
Comment: Schwehr is correct. Her points -
expressed to me privately by others - sometimes make me question my own tactics.
Yet I believe that our failure to observe that "colonialism" and "colonization" are appropriate metaphors. (They do not assume malfeasance, only that the colonizer assumes that he/she/it knows what is best for the other.) The current predicament of a whole person,
inter-disciplinary paradigm inside the Pharma-driven, mainly reductive
universe of the NIH also, to use Schwehr's words, "flattens diversity and difference, and
inhibits potential understanding" if not mutual interest. Then again,
it was not mutual interest that created NCCAM in the first place, but
rather, a Congressional mandate against which the stomach (and pride) of many in the NIH continue to rebel. Still, Schwehr's points are good ones.
Does financial self-interest limit researcher openness?
3. Anonymous researcher: "trying to build a career, it's not wise to comment"
I emailed a colleague who is an academic medicine researcher to see
if the person had been following the NCCAM discussion and if so, to
comment. The writer made clear a desire to not be publicly quoted.
"If
you are referring to the discussions about the new director, I do find the
conversations interesting and relevant; why they chose this particular new
director is beyond me. There are a number of highly qualified academic
CAM researchers that would be/were good candidates. As someone who is
trying to build a career on NCCAM funding, I don't think it would be wise of me
to comment about it in public.
"From what I know, Dr. Straus' reign brought
about much progress in research funding going to CAM practitioners which I
obviously think is a good thing. Nevertheless, I think that someone that
understands 'whole systems' thinking would be an better candidate. But
idealists don't win...i.e. Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich."
Anonymous researcher
Academic Health Center
Comment: The coaxing it took for
Achterberg to make her statement publicly (thank you, Dr. Achterberg!) and the
anonymity of the third commentator suggests that freedom of expression
among researchers, and prospective researchers, may be generally
suppressed. If so, Briggs - who to all accounts is actively listening
to many voices - may not be hearing what she needs to hear as she makes
her rounds. Are her prospective grantees self-censoring to fit what is expected to be
Briggs' and NCCAM's favored agenda? Will those with whom she meets be speaking
freely?
Self-censorship is a deep, quietly invasive process. I am reminded of a time 20
years ago when I was a free-lancer for a weekly which had a strong-minded civic leader as
editor-publisher and a pervasive style and tone. After publishing my 6th or 8th piece, I realized how deeply I had internalized those the publisher-editor's
norms. I also realized that the unwritten standards were not only influencing the way I
presented my ideas. More significantly, my now internalized world view was shaping both the way I was asking questions and the
kinds of questions I was asking. What may feel abrasive to some is that
I sense something similar has happened here. Do we need renewal and re-connectivity to the core research questions which will advance what all the clinicians - if not the presently funded body of researchers - have viewed as a new, health oriented, whole practice paradigm of clinical care?
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