28 Oct What is Holistic Medicine?
Holistic medicine has gained in popularity over the last two decades because of its philosophy of treating the whole body and the underlying causes of illness rather than focusing solely on patients’ symptoms. Holistic allergy medicine, for example, doesn’t just treat the symptoms of chronic allergies, but instead brings about a full range of conventional and alternative therapies that all have merit and are rooted in science. Because of this approach, a holistic allergist in Arlington Heights, IL, has additional treatment and therapy options that can produce positive outcomes for patients when traditional medicine alone was unsuccessful.
Despite its increasing popularity, many still don’t fully understand holistic medicine, its roots, and its practices. Therefore, they shy away from the potentially successful alternatives offered by holistic medical practices even though they could prove beneficial. Holistic medicine provides treatments that can boost the efficacy of one another. Understanding the range of benefits that can be realized through a more holistic approach to health is key to providing additional treatment options to those who can benefit from them. Keep reading to learn more about holistic medicine and its approach to patient health.
What is Holistic Medicine?
Holistic medicine isn’t just comprised of one type of medicine. Instead, it is an amalgam of many different schools of diagnosis and treatment that come together to create an all-encompassing system devoted to overall patient health. Holistic medicine focuses on the well-being of the entire body rather than focusing on the symptoms of the condition that may be their immediate cause. Practitioners of holistic medicine see the body as a whole system made up of interconnected parts, and when one part is out of balance, it can impact the function of the whole. Therefore, it’s important to prevent illness by maintaining optimal health through fitness and nutrition while treating periodic maladies with a variety of therapies that include naturopathy, allopathic medicine, traditional Chinese medicine, or homeopathy.
Origins of Holistic Medicine
Though popularity is increasing when it comes to holistic medicine, its concepts aren’t new. Noted physicians and philosophers, such as Socrates and Hippocrates, proposed that the body was a whole made of interconnected systems and that any condition in one was better treated by providing for the whole. Traditional Chinese medicine has been around for thousands of years as well, and its primary approach is to observe the whole of the body and treat the underlying causes of ill health instead of symptoms. By the 20th century, many of the practices now embraced as components of holistic medicine had fallen out of favor in deference to allopathic medicine, though in the 1970s there was an upswell in patients who sought a broader range of treatment options through holistic medicine.
Principles of Holistic Medicine
In pursuit of holistic medicine, there are a few guiding principles that are used to determine treatments and patient care. While the variety of treatment options within holistic medicine is great, the guidelines focus on the patient and the doctor’s perception. Holistic health specialists believe all human beings have intuitive healing powers. Patients aren’t to be treated as a disease or collection of symptoms, but instead as people. True healing is the product of treating the whole of a person rather than seeking to alleviate symptoms, and reaching that goal involves both the patient and a team of care professionals who address every aspect of the patient’s life.
Holistic Medicine Therapies
Because the holistic practitioner embraces all treatment options that are rooted in science, there are many potential therapy options used to treat a wide variety of conditions. Some of the commonly used practices that fall beneath the umbrella of holistic medicine include conventional allopathic medicine, herbal medicine, homeopathy, naturopathy, traditional Chinese medicine or TCM, Ayurvedic medicine, chiropractic care, meditation, massage, psychotherapy, and nutritional therapies. The goal is to formulate a noninvasive course of treatment that utilizes multiple tools to treat the overall health of the individual.
Holistic medicine is no longer a fringe philosophy but is being embraced by patients and care providers from many backgrounds. It provides a full array of treatment tools and therapies that can work wonders for those who suffer from an assortment of conditions. To learn more about holistic medicine, visit Midwest Allergy Relief Centers.
