Integrative Medicine and Integrated Health Care Round-up:  March 3-April 7, 2009

Summary: NCCAM challenged in Washington Post piece ... Consumer Reports finds highest satisfaction with chiropractors for back pain ...  Economic downturn and consumer-directed healthcare appear to be good for supplements sales ... American Health Journal and AANP team for 6-part PBS series on naturopathic medicine ... Massage licensing boards under attack in 2 states ...  InnoVision, publisher of ATHM and other peer-reviewed journals in integrative practice purchased, exits Chapter 11  ... Lobbyist Peter Reinecke and Jeanne Drisko, MD on Obama's HHS nominee, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius ... Disease management giant Healthways appoints Mark Nolting, ND, LAc to head up integrative medicine ... Andrew Weil's foundation scores coup in appointing former medical school dean James Dalen, MD, MPH to executive director ... Two Integrator contributors, Stephen Bolles, DC and Erik Goldman organize conferences on key integrative practice themes, the Vis Medicatrix Naturae, and business success, respectively.

Change.gov campaign against NCCAM continues in a Washington Post article

The campaign against NCCAM on the www.change.gov site, to which the Integrator helped mount a response in mid-January made it inside the Washington Post. (Regarding the campaign, see

Hello Mr. Brown -

I write in response to your piece on opposition to NIH NCCAM.

If you had read ALL of the comments on the Obama site you would have seen a distinct pattern. From the posting on the Wednesday (I believe it was) prior to the closure of the site, there began a rash of negative comments. This has all the signs of a campaign, as in: Friends, I am positing this, please join me. The people who are opposed to NCCAM are an organized group (SEE SAMPLE: http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/03/senator_tom_harkin.php ) with their own list-serve, their own blog. My guess is that this was an organized campaign, smartly timed to fall shortly before the closure of the site. No wonder a skim through those comments would net what you reported.

However, if you read on, the comments begin to change on Saturday then change in a major way in the last 6 hours of posting, on Sunday. That is because those opposed to shutting down NCCAM began discovering the question and notifying some of their friends.  I was among those notified as I am known for a loyal opposition stance toward NCCAM. I think the Center is critically important but believe the reductive research, not appropriate for integrative practices, has guaranteed the poor results. I mailed an alert to my own list (www.theintegratorblog.com) at 9:00 AM PST, 6 hours before the site was to be shut. (See below.) Take a look at the multitude of comments that came in on Sunday. If it hadn’t shut 6 hours later, many more comments would have been posted, in favor of NCCAM over the ensuing few days.

The “grassroots” can be manipulated, and were twice, here. Only, unfortunately, by limiting your review, you were utterly duped by the first post, and the result was bad journalism. Can you make amends? Thank you.

Taught by consumers to respect chiropractic?

Consumer Reports finds consumers most satisfied with chiropractors for back pain

The May 2009 Consumer Reports  includes a survey that found that 59% of consumers who used chiropractic were "highly satisfied" with their care. This compared to 55% for those seeing physical therapists, 53% for those seeing acupuncturists, 44% physician specialists and 34% primary care physicians. (The review did not appear to consider massage therapists or yoga therapists or other practitioner options.) The positive portrayal of chiropractic was a shift for the magazine, which has historically been antagonistic to the field, according to chiropractor Lou Sportelli, DC. A factor in the shift appears to  have been the January/February 2008 special issue of The Spine Journal which focused on ways to treat low back pain. Scott Haldeman, MD, co-editor of the Spine issue was among those interviewed by Consumer Reports for the piece.

Evidence that economic problems are good for supplement sales

A recent article in the New York Times (As Economy is Down, Vitamin Sales are Up, April 4, 2009) suggests that what is good for the goose may not indeed be good for the gander. The 414 store chain Vitamin Shoppe has seen a 20% rise in new customers in the last 6 months. Vitamin sales were up 8% in December of 2008 over the prior year. Interestingly, the writer interviews Princeton's Uwe Reinhardt, MD, a top medical economist and healthcare analyst, who positions this shift more broadly as a logical extension of "consumer-directed healthcare." Reinhardt also links the decision-making to consumer awareness that once they step into the "formal health system, you very quickly lose control over what this costs you." The article reflects the perspective in a January 2009 ABC News item (With Economy Sour, Consumers Sweet on Herbal Meds). Thanks to Mitch Stargrove, ND, LAc for send both items.

 

Professions

Naturopathic doctors partner with American Health Journal for PBS series

A six-part series on naturopathic medicine will begin airing April 8, 2009 on Orange County, California's KOCE, the sixth largest PBS station in the country. The series is produced by PBS's American Health Journal "in conjunction with the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians (AANP)," according to a release from the national professional association. The AANP fundraised a portion of the show's costs over the last two years. According to the release, the series will focus on "

." The motivations are very different. In Arkansas, the legislator would seek to put the board under the state board of health while in New Mexico the effort would push the field into an unregulated zone under a health freedom-oriented drive. The American Massage Therapy Association and the Associated Bodywork and Massage Professionals , a business that provides malpractice services to the profession, are among those actively opposing both bills.


Policy

Kathleen Sebelius: consumer advocate for HHS Secretary

Lobbyist Peter Reinecke and Jeanne Drisko, MD on HHS Secretary nominee Kathleen Sebelius

While many in the integrative practice community has some familiarity with Tom Daschle, who withdrew from consideration as Obama's Secretary of Health and Human Services, less is known about present nominee, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius. Jeanne Disko, MD, who heads up integrative medicine at the University of Kansas responded to an Integrator query with this comment:

Governor Sebelius is seen as pro-consumer and very good at working with both political parties as she twice won in very Republican Kansas. I'm hearing now that Margaret Hamburg, former Clinton HHS staff and NYC Health Commissioner is likely to get FDA with Sharfstein being her principal deputy. Also, Bill Schultz is still likely as HHS General Counsel.

Sebelius is the daughter of former Ohio congressman and Governor John Gilligan. Indeed, she and her father, who also served as former President Jimmy Carter's administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), form the first and only father-daughter team of governors in U.S. history.
 
But it is not actually Sebelius' experience as a governor that matters so much as her previous experience as Kansas' elected state insurance commissioner. Elected to that position as a Democrat running in the very Republican year of 1994, she redefined the job, breaking the hold of the big insurance companies -- whose contributions she had refused -- on the department and establishing it as a strong and independent defender of consumers.
 
Sebelius employed all the powers of her position -- something her predecessors had failed to do -- to crack down on HMOs that denied care to Kansans and pressed for expanded access to care and prescription drugs. She would maintain that pressure after being elected governor in 2002, another very Republican year when her reputation as an independent, consumer-defending reformer helped her survive the GOP tide.
 
In what was arguably her most significant act as insurance commissioner, Sebelius took on the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas monolith, blocking the sale of the state's largest health insurer to an out-of-state corporation that was all but certain to raise premiums. That was a groundbreaking move as Kansas became the first state to effectively challenge the Blue Cross and Blue Shield acquisition and merger frenzy.
 
It was also as insurance commissioner, and as the president of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, that Sebelius emerged as an outspoken and effective proponent of a national bill of rights for patients -- something the insurance conglomerates and the health care industry feared -- and she took a leading role in drafting a proposed bill of rights.
 
Insurance Commissioners do not usually get a lot of national notice, but Sebelius became a regular at congressional hearings -- establishing herself as an expert on the complex interplay of the federal government and the states when it comes to health care policy -- and she was named by Governing magazine as one it its "Public Officials of the Year."

Peter Reinecke
Reinecke Strategic Solutions, Inc.
6107 Ridge Drive
Bethesda, MD 20816

Business

Ready to roll following purchase

InnoVision (ATHM, Integrative Medicine, Advances)

Mark Nolting, ND, LAc

Nolting takes key CAM and integrative medicine role with disease-management giant Healthways

James Dalen, MD, MPH

Weil foundation appoints James Dalen, MD, MPH executive director

James Dalen, MD, MPH, former dean of the University of Arizona College of Medicine has been appointed executive director of the Weil Foundation. The foundation, founded by integrative medicine leader Andrew Weil, MD, focuses on transforming medical education. He notes in a release from the Foundation that Dalen was "the first medical school dean in the country to promote the values of integrative medicine," and that Dalen's past work will add to the Foundation's credibility. The is 90% funded through Weil's own contributions, including all of the after-tax profits from the sales of Weil's natural products line, Weil Lifestyle, LLC. In 2008, the foundation awarded $670,000 in grants. The major beneficiary of Foundation funding is the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine which Weil founded. An article in the Arizona media on the appointment is located here.

Stephen Bolles-coordinated conference on vitalism and the healing power of nature at

Holistic Primary Care sponsors "Heal Thy Practice" conference in Tuscon, June 5-7, 2009

Medical reporter Erik Goldman, editor of Holistic Primary Care (HPC) is a keen observer of the integrative practice field. Goldman's insights are rolled into the fabric of the publication's first venture into the conference world, June 5-7 in Tucson entitled: "Physician, Health Thy Practice: Transforming Primary Care."

• The Concierge Health Care Model
• Essential Do's and Don’ts for Marketing a Holistic Practice
• Transitioning from Insurance-Based Medicine to Fee-For-Service
• Online Marketing
• The Return of the House Call Physician
• Group Nutrition Counseling: A Model for Change
• Medicolegal Issues in Holistic Health Care
• Creating "Five-Star Medical Care": Restoring the Physician-Patient Relationship
• Successful Implementation of Electronic Health Records & Practice Management Tools
• Finding Balance in a Medical Life
• Practice Management Nuts & Bolts: Understanding Profit/Loss, Right-Sizing Your Staff, Engendering a Culture of Excellence in Your Office