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background resources in PDF |
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some CAM/IM publication links |
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Issues #72 & #73 - Jan-Feb 2010 |
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Written by John Weeks
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Issues #72 & #73 - Jan-Feb 2010____________________
Issue
#73 March 7, 2010
March 7, 2010
McCain-Dorgan bill stirs battle over supplement
regulation McCain backs off ... Action urged to support "licensed
integrative practitioners" in federal legislation ... Senator Mikulski
salutes Integrative Healthcare Symposium attendees ... Bill George
pushes reform at personal and state levels .. Brent Bauer, MD reports on
Mayo's growing integrative medicine initiative ... True North patient survey featured in American College
of Physicians' publication ... Naparstek's Health Journeys CD sent by
DoD to help soldiers in war zone ... Acupuncture
accreditation agency moves ahead with "first professional doctorate"
... A first: Chiropractic faculty members
credentialed to teach in VA facilities via NYCC relationships ...
Washington state legislature announces annual Bastyr Day ... Oregon
naturopathic doctors included in loan-forgiveness program for service to
the underserved and in rural areas ... Chiropractors
explore role in public health ... NJ chiropractors add homeopathy,
nutrition to practice; Gahles comments ... Hawai'i medical association
seek to strip scope additions of state's naturopathic doctors ... AMI
seeks expansion of integrative Medicaid pilot into Arizona ... ABC
blasts peer-reviewed piece on drug-herb interactions ... Newsweek
rips anti-depressants as "Tic tacs" ... Stargrove and MedicineWorks
release electronic interactions guide ... Olympic athletes sponsored by
supplement lines ... Profootball chiropractic association in 4th
conference ... Integrative Healthcare Symposium up 40%, gains status as
community gathering ... Arizona Center's integrative mental health
conference sells out ... Ann Fonda reports on the Annie Appleseed
Project ... Pelletier takes vice president role at American Specialty
Health ... Miller-Read takes over as AMTA president ... More
March 6, 2010
The "McCain
Bill,"as it quickly became known, has stirred up a furor in the
integrative practice and natural products communities. Practitioner,
consumer and industry interests are peppering their lists with alerts
about a proposed bill which they argue will increase regulatory burden,
limit access to supplements and significantly increase costs. US Senator
John McCain used the Senator floor to take on the arguments of his
opponents. Major league sports are backing McCain. The proposal is
called the Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2010. Here are links to key
viewpoints followed by a critical analysis from Integrator columnist
Michael Levin whose professional career spans executive positions in
big Pharma and the supplements industry. He offers a useful regulatory
strategy by focusing on the narrows of the production river. (Note: At
publication time word arrived that McCain was backing down.) More
February 23, 2010
The strategic plan
for NIH National Center for Complementary
and Alternative Medicine showed steps
toward clarification at the February 5, 2010 meeting of the National Advisory Council. This report from Integrator columnist Taylor Walsh
share's the agency's directions, plus a list of the 5 new appointees.
The range of initiatives is wide, from reductive approaches to products
to engaging lifestyle-change initiatives and mind-body interventions.
Council member Janet Kahn, PhD reviewed Walsh's article and offers
additional perspectives on the direction. Kahn calls to the practitioner
community that is interested in "real world research" to utilize
NCCAM's existing health services research initiative. More
February 21, 2010
I split my
professional life between the Integrator and related writing and
the organization featured here, the
Academic Consortium for Complementary and Alternative Health Care
(ACCAHC). This multidisciplinary entity lives and breaths the
integration-related issues reported in the Integrator. This Quarterly
Report: announces planned June 26-28, 2011 conference; honors Lucy
Gonda as ACCAHC's founding philanthropic partner; announces an
initiative with UCLA health policy leader Michael Goldstein, PhD on
ACCAHC's professions and the primary care need; links to a resource on
all accreditation standards of the ACCAHC educational programs relative
to referral/collaboration and prevention/wellness; and shares steps in
the release of the Clinicians'
and Educators' Desk Reference on the Licensed Complementary and
Alternative Healthcare Professions. More
February 21, 2010
Frank
Ervolino, ND, LAc reviews issues on the "first professional doctorate"
for the acupuncture and Oriental medicine field ... Lou Sportelli, DC
on how NCCAM needs to research the way practitioners operate ... Roger
Jahnke, OMD's shares his letter to US Senator Barbara Boxer promoting
wellness and integrative practice ... Glenn Sabin of FON Therapeutics
comments on whole systems research in the IOM's report on the National
Summit on Integrative Medicine and the Health of the Public ... Late
nominations for Top 10 People from 2009: Harry Pruess, MD nominates
Gretchen LeBeau; Emily Kane, ND, LAc nominates the head of the Coalition
for Patients Rights; and the head of the Wapello, Iowa, County Medical
Society indirectly nominates chiropractor Charles Coram, DC. More
February 15, 2010
If you support integrative practice, here are 6
specific reasons to write your members of Congress now. Proposed
legislation sits on the desks of members of Congress that, if passed,
includes integrative practitioners and integrative practices in federal
policy for the first time. While tucked into corners of legislative
packages, these advances would be huge. Included are non-discrimination,
workforce, medical homes, community health, comparative effectiveness
research, and health promotion. Here is information, a draft letter, and
how-to link to your members of Congress. We speak of helping shift U.S.
medicine. Now is an important time to weigh in. More
February 11, 2010
A recently published edited reference text
on the licensed integrative practice professions includes
educator-leaders' perspectives on the top challenges and opportunities
for each of these fields for 2009-2012. The
licensed fields represented are chiropractic medicine, acupuncture and
Oriental medicine, naturopathic medicine, massage therapy and direct
entry midwifery. Educator and
accreditation leader Jan Schwartz, MA, analyzed the responses of the
chapter author teams, each of which was selected by national educational
organizations for their respective fields. Schwartz' goal: find common
themes to shape a cross-disciplinary work agenda. Here is a look at the intersecting horizons of these
professions, high and low, as forecast by these educator-authors. More
Issue
#72 February 4, 2010
February 3, 2010
Allina Hospitals initiative finds $2000 savings per
patient stay with integrative care ... JAMA column from Ralph Snyderman,
MD reports that Duke Prospective Health created $2200 per employee per
year in savings associated with personalized, integrative approach ...
NIH workshop to explore cost effectiveness of dietary supplement
interventions ... MD academics urge NCCAM to support non-MD CAM
investigators in 2011-2015 strategic plan ... "Licensed integrative
practitioners" included in Senate reform language on comparative
effectiveness research ... U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and
Quality recognizes naturopathic doctors as primary care .... US Senator
Mikulski pitches "integrative health care" as key health reform
principle in constituent letter ... AMA News reports trends in
AMA campaign to restrict the scopes of NDs, DCs, AOM practitioners,
midwives and others ... AANP and ACA send letters to members relative to
the AMA campaign to restrict their practices ... Widely reported survey
led by UCLA's Michael Goldstein, PhD shows strong support for CAM among
75% of medical school student respondents ... New York Chiropractic
College offers online nutrition Masters degree ... Mayo Clinic
integrative medicine educates team about aromatherapy, Qi Gong and other
certificate programs via local community college ... Tai Sophia gains
state approval for 5 new certificate programs to help create a wellness
workforce ... Update on massage educator not-for-profit start-up ...
Acupuncturists Without Borders and Natural Doctors International respond
to Haiti disaster ... Standard Process sales hit $100-million mark; a
look at its corporate citizenship ... Yale integrative medicine
conference to feature NCCAM's Briggs plus CAM-basher Novella ...
Conference notes ... plus
more
January 29, 2010
Responses of readers
from the acupuncture and Oriental medicine (AOM) profession challenged a
statement in the most recent Integrator round-up. They argue
that there is no "emerging consensus" on the proposal of the Accreditation Commission for
Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (ACAOM) to establish a "first
professional doctorate" (FPD) for the profession. Here are responses and
links to the heated debate. Included are
statements from the Community Acupuncture Network (opposed) and the
American Association of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (in favor). CAN will formally take their protest to the US Department of Education should ACAOM go forward. I
follow with some altogether non-conclusive comments. More
January 28, 2010
This article continues an Integrator series on
stakeholder perspectives on NCCAM's 2011-2015 strategic plan. Included are the positions of three significant
organizations: the Consortium of Academic
Health Centers for Integrative Medicine (CAHCIM) representing 44
medical schools, Council for Responsible
Nutrition (CRN) representing large dietary supplement interests, and the
American Massage Therapy Association (AMTA), the largest 501c6
professional association for that field of some 250,000 practitioners.
These positions add to the set of 8 stakeholder responses previously
published. One question posed: What would a "balanced" NCCAM portfolio
include? Also noted are two other influential stakeholders: the NIH and
the NCCAM's blogging detractors. More
January 26, 2010
An additional significant place where integrative
practitioners gained an explicit foothold in Congressional action
relative to health reform is in the comparative effectiveness research
(CER) language in SB 3590. Gretchen DuBeau, executive director of the
Alliance for Natural Health-USA shared with the Integrator that
her association worked closely with US Senators Kent Conrad and Barbara
Mikuski to secure the inclusion. Interestingly, ANH-USA, despite its
work, is deeply concerned about the outcomes of the CER movement, and in
fact opposes the reform legislation. The relevant sections are printed
here. More
January 20, 2010
As 2009 ended and 2010 dawned, some Top 10 lists for
the 2000-2009 decade began to show up in newspapers and magazines. What a
time this decade has been for integrative medicine and integrative
health care! Despite having written not one but two Top 10s for the
year of 2009, I couldn't resist reflecting on the decade that was. I
developed this for a media outlet which is not inside the integrative
practice fields as a short history, in the form of a Top 10. I hope
regular Integrator readers will find this reflection of interest.
As usual, I look forward to any of your comments, corrections, or views
about any oversights. More
January 12, 2010
The annual publication of an Integrator Top 10
list always leaves room for reader submissions of their recommendations.
This year brought some excellent suggestions, for both Top 10 Actions
and Events and the first time, Top 10 People. From the responses, we
have proved that we are well integrated into popular culture: the People
list stimulated more responses. Here are the Integrator reader
nominations from 2009. More
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