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Integrative Medicine, Complementary and Alternative Medicine and Health Round-up #74: December 2013 |
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Written by John Weeks
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Integrative Medicine, Complementary and Alternative Medicine and Health Round-up #74: December 2013Policy
-WHO
publishes Traditional Medicine Strategy for 2014-2023
-IHPC adds voice to chorus of
coalitions opposing HR 2817 effort to maintain discrimination in health care
 No mention of integrative health in primary care reports
-Taylor Walsh on Health Affairs-AAMC
Briefing: Continued non-inclusion of licensed integrative health and medicine
in the workforce
-Oregon chiropractors take non-discrimination fight (Section 2706) to Governor
Kitzhaber
-Washington States naturopathic doctors
begin optional role as Medicaid providers
Research
-NCCAM-funded
study on EDTA chelation therapy shows compelling value for people with diabetes
-Clinic
led by Dan Labriola, ND receives $560,000 Takeda grant to test naturopathic
protocol for limiting adverse effects of firm's Velcade
Academic
Medicine
-Entrepreneurial Maryland
University of Integrative Health announces "philosophy in action" certificate
plus a deal with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition
Organizations
-Beth Sommers: Report on Alternative
and Complementary Health Practices content at the APHA 2013
-American
Botanical Council blasts USA Today
and BMC Medicine for falsehoods
on the herb industry
-Institute for Alternative Futures, a
key player in the integrative health and medicine movement, declares a new
vision statement
 Clinton: cameo appearance at Bravewell
Philanthropy
-Column honors Bravewell Collaborative at the time of their announced
"sun-setting," with an appearance by Hillary Clinton
-Robert Wood Johnson funds Kaptchuk's
placebo work at Harvard
Miscellaneous
-Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine enters 20th year with huge increase in reach
-Smithsonian Galleries, yoga group and
GWU integrative medicine co-sponsor Medical Yoga Symposium
People
-Sandi Amoils, MD the president-elect
of the American Medical Acupuncture Association
-Integrative pain pioneer Heather Tick,
MD' Holistic Pain Relief
published
-Heather Greenlee, ND, PhD, first
naturopathic president of the Society for Integrative Oncology
______________________________
Policy
 New strategic plan for T&CM
WHO publishes Traditional Medicine Strategy for 2014-2023
The World Health Organization (WHO) has published its Traditional Medicine
Strategy 2014-2023. The document differs from the 2002-2005 strategic plan
in routinely referencing not just TM but rather "Traditional &
Complementary Medicine (T&CM)" to better link traditional use to the
growing option of traditional medicines in countries where industrial medicine
dominates. The goals of the publication are to support WHO member states in: "1)
harnessing the potential contribution of T&CM to health, wellness,
people-centered health care and (universal health coverage (UHC); and 2)
promoting safe and effective use of T&CM through the regulation, research
and integration of T&CM products, practices and practitioners into the
health system, as appropriate." The 78-page document includes 12 pages of
"Strategic objectives, strategic directions and strategic options."
The document was produced following four working group meetings during 2011-2013
of 15-20 international advisers.
 Invited to participate
Comment: The new plan differs significantly from the 2002-2005 WHO
strategic plan for traditional medicine -- the only prior such strategy
document - in chiefly two ways. One is the focus on not just products but also
"practices and practitioners." This is related to the WHO's interest
into their integration into the health systems and the role of T&CMs in
contributing to the WHO's broad goal of universal health coverage (UHC). For
these reasons, I had the honor of being invited to participate in two of the planning
sessions on behalf of the Academic Consortium for Complementary
and Alternative Health Care (ACCAHC). The organization was included as perhaps
the most significant, functional, multidisciplinary organization of T&CM
practitioners/academics globally. Those who open the new document will
realize that the focus is surely on the rest of the world. I was the only U.S.
person present at both meetings. The NIH NCCAM has discontinued the only
coordinating center in the U.S. related to the WHO's T&CM initiative.
Canadians had a stronger presence, including the lead author, Andrea Burton.
(Thanks to Burton and Integrator
adviser Paolo Roberti di Sarsina, MD for sending the report. Side note:
Roberti di Sarsina is the only Italian author cited in the report's
references.) Curious about any of your feedback.
 Weighs in against 2817
IHPC adds voice to chorus of coalitions opposing HR 2817 effort to maintain
discrimination in health care
On October 16, 2013, the Integrative Healthcare Policy Consortium sent a letter
to the Congressmen Fred Upton (R)and Henry Waxman (D-CA) in opposition to the
misleadingly-named Protect
Patient Access to Quality Health Professionals Act of 2013 (H.R. 2817).
IHPC is a national coalition comprised of 13 organizations and institutions "representing
a variety of licensed and state and nationally certified healthcare
professionals." HR 2817 would revoke Section 2706 of the Affordable Care
Act, called Non-Discrimination in Health Care. IHPC argues, in part,
that Sec 2706 "safeguards patient access to non-MD/DO state licensed
or state certified providers, including (but not limited to) chiropractors,
naturopathic physicians, acupuncturists, massage therapists, osteopaths,
optometrists, nurse practitioners and licensed or direct entry midwives and
podiatrists, as long as they are licensed by the state and can treat the
condition within that provider's scope of practice." The bill is backed by
conventional medical specialties who claim a risk to patients from expanding
scopes of other disciplines.
Comment: IHPC is the third major practitioner coalition to weigh-in
their opposition, following the Coalition for Patients Rights, as
reported here
in the November 2013 Round-up, and PARCA, as reported here in the September
13, 2013 Integrator Round-up. Nice concerted action from the, in
this case, "non-allied healthcare professions."
 Walsh: reports on the absence of integrative practitioners
Taylor Walsh on Health Affairs-AAMC Briefing: Continued non-inclusion of
licensed integrative health and medicine in the workforce
In a report
in The Integrator, journalist-integrative health consultant Taylor Walsh writes:
"The reconfiguration of the American healthcare workforce is a topic of
intense examination, but if a national conference in Washington last week is
any indication, the role for integrative health disciplines will remain ‘a
hidden dimension,' as described by the Academic Consortium for Complementary
and Alternative Health Care in its 2013 white paper,
‘Meeting the Nation's Primary Care Needs.'" The briefing was
sponsored by the Health Affairs
and Academic Medicine (the
Journal of the American Association of Medical Colleges), both of whose
November 2013 issues were devoted to the workforce challenges addressed at the
briefing.
Walsh continues: "While the topic of non-physician leadership in
primary care and in other points of delivery was thoroughly discussed, any role
for integrative disciplines as contributors to such a solution was oblique, at
best. But it is also clear that sharing any physician-assigned responsibility
even with nurse practitioners or physician assistants will be a tremendous
culture pull that will not quickly come to pass." Walsh adds that two
presenters offered the most potent visions for adjusting the prevailing medical
education culture: Edward Salsberg, director of the National Center for Health
Workforce Analysis at HRSA, and George Thibault, president of the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, which has
take a leading role in funding interprofessional care and workforce development
innovations.
 Goldstein: co-author of ACCAHC report
Comment: I am a co-author with Michael Goldstein, PhD of the UCLA Center for Health
Policy Research on the ACCAHC report referenced by Walsh. The project made
clear that, whatever the exclusionary views of the current policy professionals
in charge of workforce planning, they are missing a significant chunk of what,
in this patient-centered care era, Goldstein and I chose to call "primary
providers of care." These are the licensed so-called CAM practitioners who
millions of people turn to instead of their formal, system-centered "PCPs,"
whether MDs or PAs or nurses. We don't have a clear estimate, but there is no
doubt that these licensed practitioners are relieving a significant burden from
the mainstream primary care system. They should, in an open and unprejudiced society,
and more certainly in a nominally patient-centered system, be in the workforce calculations
and dialogue. Walsh's
account of the meeting is thoughtful and worth a read.
 State ripe with activity on non-discrimination
Oregon chiropractors take non-discrimination fight (Section 2706) to Governor
Kitzhaber
The November 22, 2013 edition of the Lund Report on Oregon health policy shares
that the state's chiropractors are pushing hard for a broad inclusion of
chiropractors under the Section 2706 provision of the Affordable Care Act. Chiropractors
Take Discrimination Fight to the Governor notes that Governor John
Kitzauber, MD supports a broad interpretation. It was Kitzauber, according to
the article, who argued for their necessary inclusion in the state's coordinated care
organizations. The Oregon Chiropractic Association's Vern Saboe, DC, whose
lobbying work is featured, argues that "chiropractors are equipped to do
much more than just spinal manipulation and can treat the 60 most common
conditions dealt with by primary care physicians such as hypertension, mild
diabetes, hypothyroidism and food allergies." Adds Saboe: "We intend to
keep the pressure on so that the federal law is enacted as it was intended from
the top down, and the governor is absolutely supportive that we should be fully
included in the healthcare system. Chiropractic is a profession, not a single
modality."
Comment: Fighting words! Notably, Oregon is a state with a broad scope
of practice for chiropractors and a chiropractic academic program at the
University of Western States that promotes a functional medicine approach to
chiropractic and a role for doctors of chiropractic in primary care. A
challenge for the profession is to help payers distinguish between those who
are "primary care for back pain" or more broadly primary care. Saboe's last
comment should be taken up, ceaselessly, as a banner by each of the so-called
"CAM" disciplines: "We are professions, not single
modalities." Each member must start by reprogramming their colonized minds
from ever using the "modality" or "therapy" word to describe what happens
in their offices. Side note: a more
recent issue of The Lund Report shares that the Blue Shield firm Regence has moved
to limit access to licensed integrative health practitioners.
 ND group moves into Medicaid
Washington States naturopathic doctors begin optional role as Medicaid
providers
An article entitled Medicaid
- A New Environment for NDs in the Fall 2013 issue of the newsletter of the
Washington Association of Naturopathic Physicians lays out a brave new
world that will open for these practitioners in January 2014. The writer notes
that the opening into "Apple Health," the state's re-named Medicaid
program, "is a significant achievement for our profession in terms of
recognition and inclusion of naturopathic medicine in the health care
system" and also "brings the promise of expanding the value of our
medicine to a population that has not had much access to it in the past."
The writer is honest about the impact on practices: "At this point we
don't really know." Then: "Below is the information we have thus far,
but be forewarned - these are uncharted waters and before you rush to ‘sign up
for more patients', we really encourage you to do your research." Those NDs
who wish to take a look at the assembled piloting log for these waters are
urged to read
on here. The author suggests that those who participate share their
stories so that WANP can build an archive of Medicaid experience.
Comment: Key features of health professionals of the future, as recommended
through the
Lancet Report of Health Professionals for a New Century is that they
be 1) leaders, that their leadership be focused on 2) "change
agency," and that they be 3) comfortable with ambiguity. Engaging
Medicaid, choosing to be under-paid and bureaucratically Lilliputianized in
order to meet one's mission to serve the underserved or advance one's
profession, looks an awful lot like falling down a rabbit hole; or, if more
awake to the challenges, the engagement of a hero's journey.
Research
 Publishes positively on chelation
NCCAM-funded study on EDTA chelation therapy shows compelling value for
people with diabetes
The November 26, 2013 e-news from the NIH NCCAM led with a title and link that
will have the mainstream cardiology and endocrinology communities diving deep
for hoped for methodological bungling. Entitled New TACT
Analysis Shows EDT-Chelation Therapy Has Beneficial Outcomes for People with
Diabetes. The brief by NCCAM director Josie Briggs, MD closed the first
paragraph with: "EDTA-based chelation treatments produced a marked
reduction in cardiovascular events and [reduction in] death in participants
with diabetes." Then, interestingly: "Furthermore, the results
suggest that treatments had no benefit in those who did not
have diabetes." This is the second significant publication that
has shown value from EDTA chelation therapy. The first, published in
the Journal of the American Medical Association, found a slight,
positive statistical significance relative to cardiac events in people with
previous myocardial infarction. Briggs shared that, for the diabetes
drill-down, the positive "effects are large" and "strongly"
warrant future study. She adds that "these findings are a reminder that we
need to keep an open mind in research, as scientific investigation is rich with
examples of unexpected outcomes."
Comment: The NCCAM significant investment in the EDTA-chelation trial
has been viewed by NCCAM's antagonists as one of the most insane of the agency's
boon-doggles. This study, more than the first, gives an attaboy to the
agency for examining outcomes such as US
Senator Harkin urged in the agency's mandate: real world look at perhaps
the most significant therapy, from an economic perspective, used by what were
once called "alternative medical doctors."
 Labriola: clinician receives grant for integrative oncology study
Clinic led by Dan Labriola, ND receives $560,000 grant to test
naturopathic protocol to limit adverse effects of Velcade
In an unusual and perhaps historic
move, Millennium: The Takeda Oncology Company has granted Seattle
Northwest Natural Clinic $560,000 for a two-year trial that will
"focus on mitigating a potential side effect of Velcade, an FDA approved, targeted
chemotherapy approved for the treatment of multiple myeloma and other
cancers" according to an article in the Ballard News-Tribune.
The clinic was founded by Dan Labriola, ND. The study will focus on a side effect,
peripheral neuropathy, which manifests as numbness in the extremities. The writer
continues: "Northwest Natural Clinic's method, which has extensive anecdotal
effectiveness, uses a combination of natural amino acid and a special form of
Vitamin B to limit the neuropathy."
Comment: Labriola has been a long-time leader in integrative oncology.
His national visibility dates back to a study he had published in Oncology
in 1999 that explored possible interactions between antioxidants and
chemotherapy. His clinic has had a long affiliation with Swedish Hospital for
which he is listed
under physicians and providers. This appears to be a good sort of
outcomes-type, researching the way we practice, real-world study that
NIH NCCAM would be funding in spades were it to take seriously the rfal-world
charge mentioned above and in Section
C of its mandate.
Academic Medicine
 MUIH's Vitale: entrepreneurial push at integrative health university
Entrepreneurial MUIH announces "philosophy
in action" certificate plus a deal with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition
The Maryland University of Integrative Health
(formerly Tai Sophia Institute) has announced a new Philosophy and Healing in Action 12-month certificate course.
The program features the institution's co-founders, acupuncturists and authors Bob
Duggan, and Dianne Connelly. The entrepreneurial MUIH has also recently signed
an agreement with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition (IIN) through
which the latter's graduates have an opportunity to apply for three MUIH
Masters' level programs with advanced standing.
Comment: The one-two combination of MUIH's business-savvy Frank
Vitale, president, and academic lead Judith
Broida, PhD has moved MUIH into a remarkably fecund era in which new
programs and agreements to support others, like that which IIN, seem to be
rolling out monthly. The certificate program will benefit from Duggan's
outspoken radicalism about what we need to be doing to create a culture in
medicine that focuses on health creation. He was advocated, with tongue only
partly in cheek, that acupuncturists be licensed through Parks & Recreation
to keep the focus on health. Duggan is a mentee of the influential,
radical health activist Ivan
Illich, author of Medical Nemesis.
Organizations
 Sommers: reports integrative content at APHA
Beth Sommers: Report on Alternative and Complementary Health Practices
content at the APHA 2013
I invited researcher-clinician Elizabeth
Sommers, PhD, MPH, LAc, a principal with Boston's Pathways to Health, to
share her perspective on the Alternative
and Complementary Health Practices content at the recent American Public
Health Association (APHA) meeting. Sommers, who co-chairs the group,
reports:
"Overall, I was very heartened
by this year's annual meeting. First and foremost, the level of increased
awareness and acceptance of integrative/complementary approaches has
significantly improved. Great to be appreciated by our public health
colleagues! Secondly, this year's programming was truly comprehensive and in
alignment with the annual meeting theme ‘Think Global. Act
Local'.
Sommers continues: "Our Alternative
and Complementary Health Practices group hosted almost 100 oral and poster
presentations over 2 ½ days. Highlights included a panel on best practices
around the world that featured Dr. Herbert Benson (‘The Global and Location
Aspects of the Relaxation Response') and Dr. Jon Adams (co-founder of the Network of Researchers in Public Health in CAM
- ‘Developing the Public Health of Complementary and Traditional Medicine:
Critical Methods and Translational Research').
"Our group is poised to grow in numbers and apply for section status in
APHA. When we do this, we'll also update our name. Although we are very
grateful to Dr. Alan Trachtenberg for co-founding our group and giving it a
name that started with an ‘a', it's time to phase out the ‘alternative' and
replace it with more appropriate title. This process will take a few months and
involve our membership. I'll keep you posted. I expect our new name will
include some of the following words: integrative, Traditional, health.
 Complementary health practices section growing
Sommers concludes: "In terms of acupuncture, it was great to see so many presenters
describe the diverse settings into which acupuncture has been incorporated.
There seem to be many paradigms for how to do this, and hearing about the
variety of approaches was truly inspiring. Consumers are demanding that their
health care teams function in unified and patient-centric ways."
Sommers notes the 2014 APHA annual
meeting will be held in New Orleans Nov. 15-19. The theme will be "Health
Geography: How where you live affects your health and well-being." Those
who wish to hear keynote presenters for the regular APHA content from the 2013
meeting can click here.
Comment: Ah, the re-naming process, always an issue for anything
cornered, clustered and colonized as "CAM" or some version thereof,
by conventional medicine. While Arnold Relman, MD, the former editor of the
New England Journal of Medicine, is widely quoted for saying that
ultimately it's not "integrative medicine" or "alternative medicine"
but just "good medicine" toward which we are striving, the higher
standard is actually "good health." Using "integrative" and
"Traditional" and "health" are all good paths out of the
CAM trap.
.
 25th year for herb group
American Botanical Council blasts USA Today and BMC Medicine for
falsehoods on the herb industry
The American Botanical Council punched-back hard at what it calls flaws and
falsehoods in two recent media reports, one in the peer-reviewed literature and
the second in the popular media. The first was a blast at BMC Medicine
in which ABC marshaled its considerable scientific expertise in a release
entitled "Science
Group Says Article on DNA Barcode Analysis of Herbs Is Flawed, Contains Errors,
Creates Confusion, and Should Be Retracted." The peer-reviewed
critique of the BMC paper is here.
ABC's other timely response was to a
column prominently featured in USA Today that urged consumers to
avoid herbal supplements. ABC responded to the claim of the author, Kevin Pho,
MD that herbs are not regulated. They pointed to ABC's document called The
Regulated Dietary Supplement Industry: Myths of an Unregulated Industry
Dispelled.
Comment: The tack NIH NCCAM director Josie Briggs, MD took with the
anti-NCCAM naysayers at polarization-based medicine applies here. See NCCAM's
Briggs calls for "more nuanced" conversation about complementary and
integrative medicine in JAMA editorial. Really, now, must we
still be arguing this in such polarized terms? One might as well argue that
there is no value in the FDA because from time to time their misguided approvals
result in the deaths of hundreds or thousands. Good for ABC to come out fighting.
 Defines new vision
Institute for Alternative Futures, a key player in the integrative
health and medicine movement, declares a new vision statement
The Institute for Alternative Futures
(IAF) is an organization of futurists co-founded by futurists Alvin Toffler and
internationally acclaimed current chair Clem Bezold, PhD. IAF
has multiple relationships to the integrative health and medicine world. The
organization has declared a new vision: "IAF opens eyes, hearts and minds
to alternative futures showing that aspiration is powerful and enduring. We
partner with individuals, communities and organizations worldwide to look over
the horizon so that their decisions today are accountable to tomorrow. IAF
helps to create equitable, sustainable futures shaped by kindness, wisdom, and
foresight. Our work and our lives embody this hope for preferred
futures." In a reflection that
includes the influential organization's 1993 vision, IAF president and
senior futurist Jonathan Peck
particularly noted the focus on partnerships and the "IAF helps to create
equitable, sustainable futures shaped by kindness, wisdom and
foresight."
 Bezold: numerous key roles in integrative health/medicine movement
Comment: IAF, and Bezold in particular, have developed quite a resume in
the integrative health and medicine space. IAF produced an influential works on
the future of "Complementary and Alternative Medicine" in the late
1990s and a series of reports on the future of chiropractic, including most
recently Chiropractic 2025. Bezold had key roles in developing the Integrative
Medicine Industry Leadership Summits (2000-2002) and facilitated the
influential National Policy Dialogue to Advance Integrated Care (2001). He and
IAF have worked with the Bravewell Collaborative. Closest to home for me, he
was the person who, in 2005 when I was returning from a sojourn away in Central
America and wanted to create a new newsletter, suggested that I try something new
that had popped up while I was away: "blogging." (Never mind that the
Integrator Blog has never been a
blog, as such.) Bezold is a just, committed man, and a mentor to me, whose values
are stamped all over that concluding line: "... sustainable futures shaped by
kindness, wisdom and foresight." Having those traits guide us would
be, to use a term Clem taught me, a "preferred future."
Philanthropy
 Bravewell's symbol
Column honors Bravewell Collaborative at the time of their announced
"sun-setting" - with an appearance by Hillary Clinton
The opportunity to attend the fifth and final
Bravewell Gala (with the sponsorship of a Bravewell member) at which
president Christy Mack announced the decision of the organization of
philanthropists in integrative medicine to "sunset" its operations,
led me to write this for the Huffington Post: Honoring
How Powerful Consumers Known as Bravewell Implanted Integrative Medicine in the
System. The whole system, strategic approach to investment of this group of
philanthropists - mainly vital women in the 55-70 range - sequentially boosted
this field in numerous, powerful ways: infrastructure, education, authority,
evidence, visibility and leadership. There is truly a remarkable legacy. Of special
note is a
comment on the Huffington Post article from Mack, the second and final
president. She underscores a point which she likes to make when introducing her
view of the field of integrative medicine with any audience: "Integrative
Medicine is not complementary and alternative medicine."
 Mack: response on Huffington Post site
Comment: I have had my differences with Bravewell's strategy - mainly with
its essential disregard of the potential value in investing in any
organizations or initiatives not run by MDs (with the exception of one
integrative nursing program). The choice, and of course it is hers and theirs
to make, has always felt essentially non-integrative and old-medicine -
hardly transformative. Meantime, one cannot complain about the ability of these
women to access power. One visitor to the cocktail party at the Gala was Hillary
Clinton. Those with long memories will know that candidate Clinton has a deep
association with the field. She convened a 1993 meeting at the White House of 20
alternative medicine leaders. This was a break-through moment for the field
back when she was running the ill-fated Clinton healthcare reform. Her
presence, alongside the leaders of the Institute of Medicine media personality
Mehmet Oz, MD, was a fitting closing touch.
 Major foundation supports Kaptchuk
Robert Wood Johnson funds Kaptchuk's placebo work at Harvard
Better late than never department (re my reporting): earlier this year the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) awarded a $250,000
"Pioneering Ideas" grant to Harvard's Ted Kaptchuk, OMD, to
support his Program in
Placebo Studies at Harvard University. As shared in this blog on the RWJF
site, the influential foundation sees this grant as "just one way we're
exploring the power of non-medical interventions to change behavior and improve
health outcomes, from behavioral economics to positive health."
Comment: This is among the first significant RWJF grants, if not
the first, to anyone associated significantly with the integrative health and
medicine movement, with which Kaptchuk, a licensed acupuncturist, is. (The
foundation once made a small grant to support an Urban Zen initiative.) The
last time that placebo was a significant bridge to these fields was that the
exploration of the placebo's value was the closest that NIH NCCAM director
Josie Briggs had been to the field before her appointment to her role in early
2008. Whatever it takes.
Miscellaneous
Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine enters 20th year with
huge increase in reach
A letter from Mary Ann Liebert,
president and CEO of the peer-reviewed and indexed Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, celebrated JACM's growth and reach as it
enters is 20th year. According to Liebert, the journal has readers
in over 40 countries plus some 106 low-income countries, via a
"collaboration with the World Health Organization." In addition,
interest in past articles produces "over 10,000 full-text downloads per
month and nearly 20,000 abstract downloads per month." This marks a 22%
increase over 2012. Liebert also announced collaboration with the Consortium of
Academic Health Centers for  A major factor in the CAM/IM evolution
Integrative Medicine to publish abstracts and
pre-conference podcasts for the International
Research Congress on Integrative Medicine and Health, to be held May 13-16,
2014 in Miami. JCAM is an official
journal of the International Society for Complementary Medicine Research
(ISCMR), a co-sponsor of the Miami meeting. It is also the official journal of
The Society for Acupuncture Research. Kim Jobst serves as editor-in-chief.
Comment: I recall when Liebert
leapt into the scene with "the blue Journal" - JACM" - and the "green journal,"
which was not peer-reviewed and targeted clinicians and patients. Who is this woman? The durability of Jobst as
editor is certainly a cornerstone of the publication's longevity. Credit
Liebert for hanging in there.
 Co-sponsor of Smithsonian event
Smithsonian Galleries, yoga group and GWU integrative medicine co-sponsor
Medical Yoga Symposium
On January 11-12, 2014 Washington, DC, the Medical Yoga Symposium
will be held in Washington, DC as a collaboration between the Center for Integrative Medicine at the George
Washington University and Therapeutic Yoga of Greater Washington. The event
is offered in collaboration with the Smithsonian's Freer Sackler Museums of
Asian Art. These galleries are hosting an exhibit entitled Yoga:
The Art of Transformation. Among the presenters on the bill, as noted in
the November 11 newsletter of the Consortium of Academic Health Centers for
Integrative Medicine, are keynoter Dean Ornish, plus Lorenzo Cohen, Rob Saper,
Chris Streeter and Eric Schoomaker. Chiropractor Partap Khalsa will represent
NIH NCCAM director Josephine Briggs. Long time Yoga therapy leaders Sat Bir
Khalsa, Larry Payne, and Richard Miller are also on the bill. Noted the
newsletter: "This is a groundbreaking collaboration between museums and
the emerging fields of integrative medicine."
Comment: The event brings to mind one of the earliest collaborations
that elevated integrative practices in the Capitol, back in the mid-to-late
1990s, when anthropologist and integrative medicine author and sometimes
academic Marc Micozzi, MD, PhD, who was then the founding director of the National Museum of Health and Medicine.
Micozzi convened a gathering on alternative medicines. A search of the site now
only reveals the museum creating space for an
anti-CAM presentation.
People
 Amoils: next president at AAMA
Sandi Amoils, MD the president-elect of the American Medical Acupuncture Association
Long-time Cincinatti-based integrative medical doctor and acupuncturist Sandy
Amoils, MD is the president-elect of the American Medical Acupuncture
Association. Amoils and her spouse Steve Amoils, MD were pioneers in forming a
hospital-based integrative medicine center in the upper Midwest. The two have
since moved the Alliance Institute
for Integative Medicine out on its own under the fetching URL of www.myhealingpartner.com.
The team has co-authored Get Well & Stay Well - Optimal Health through
Transformational MedicineTM. Amoils will take over the
presidency in May 2014.
 Tick: new pain book out
Integrative pain pioneer Heather Tick, MD' Holistic Pain Relief
published
Back in the early 1990s when the concept of interprofessionalism had not year
received its huge boost from the Canadian government, and long before the
Health Resources Services Administration joined with a group of U.S.
foundations to start the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and
Education, Heather Tick, MD was
creating a remarkably integated, team-based, pain clinic in Toronto. Tick,
presently the holder and endowed professorship in integrative pain at the
University of Washington has recently published Holistic
Pain Relief: Dr. Tick's Breakthrough Strategies to Manage and Eliminate Pain.
The book includes liner notes from Bernie Siegel, MD, Adi Haramati, PhD,
anesthesiology professor Jane Ballantyne, MD and this writer. This is Tick's
second book.
Comment: I have the pleasure of working with Tick on the Integrative Pain
Task Force of the Academic Consortium for
Complementary and Alternative Health Care. This is what I shared on the
jacket copy: "Dr. Tick's personal experience of chronic pain and her
pioneering practi9ce of team-based integrative care make her the right voice
and the right time, A compelling story-teller, she offers crisp communication
on complex topics."
 Greenlee: first ND president of SIO
Heather Greenlee, ND, PhD - first naturopathic president of the Society for
Integrative Oncology
Integrative oncologist Heather
Greenlee, ND, PhD is the first naturopathic physician to serve as the
president of the Society for Integrative Oncology (SIO). Greenlee is an
investigator with a long association with Columbia University whose research
focuses on lifestyle issues in breast cancer modification and control. SIO,
founded by Memorial Sloan Kettering's Barrie Cassileth, PhD, has had a remarkable mix of
leaders, including a nurse practitioner, a BSc, and a PhD. Notably,
Greenlee's president-elect is another naturopathic physician who has been in
long-time leadership both at SIO and the Consortium of Academic Health Centers
for Integrative Medicine, Suzanna Zick, ND, MPH,.
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