FON: THE BUSINESS OF INTEGRATIVE HEALTH & MEDICINE

Integrative Healthcare: Same Camp, Many Tents

It never fails to amaze how this growing but still fragmented subset of medicine that is integrative healthcare is comprised of so many loosely affiliated groups and monikers.  Here’s a partial list: Integrative Medicine, Functional Medicine, Holistic Medicine, Preventive Medicine, Lifestyle Medicine, Longevity Medicine, Naturopathy, Traditional Chinese Medicine and Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Chiropractic Medicine, Ayurvedic Medicine. While clearly differing in their unique approach and purview, these groups espouse many

Yoga Milestone—First CME-Approved Conference Supports Therapeutic Value

The Mountain Pose Medicine & Yoga Symposium took place in gorgeous Copper Mountain, Colorado August 22—26, 2012. The seminal gathering marked the first CME (continuing medical education) accredited program for yoga in the United States. The annual Mountain Pose Medicine & Yoga Symposium is the brainchild of Satkirin Khalsa, MD, a longtime yoga instructor, integrative medicine physician and scientific program chair of the conference. Khalsa is deeply concerned about the

Image of health concept - word cloud or circle of contributing factors (diet, lifestyle, healtcare, family history, environment, exercise, stress, relationships, sleep, rest, hygiene), colorful sticky notes on cork bulletin board

Integrative Medicine as Standard of Care

Over 50 U.S. academic medical centers now feature some form of a CAM (complementary or alternative medicine) program. This evolution in academic healthcare delivery is better defined as Integrative Medicine in America. The sheer number of privately owned integrative clinics, centers and solo practices being launched each month is also staggering. These practices are being led by a wide range of providers—i.e., MDs, DOs, naturopaths, acupuncturists, massage therapists, chiropractors. The

A Patient’s Perspective on the Atlantic’s “The Triumph of New Age Medicine”

By Glenn Sabin Photo on left by Stephen Webster, as seen in the Atlantic article: The Triumph of New Age Medicine (Note: For those of you who missed David H. Freedman’s piece in the July 2011 edition of the Atlantic, I urge you to read it and the debate that followed.  This post was originally intended as a response to appear on the Atlantic’s Web site, but that debate has since closed.) I have employed an

Dwindling Skeptics and Rise of Integrative Health and Medicine

With the field’s steady ascent we’ve witnessed a continual decline in its nonbelievers. As a 25-year cancer patient who implemented a successful integrative oncology regimen soon after diagnosis, I have witnessed—up close and personal—the inexorable march and development of integrative medicine. Since launching FON and joining the integrative health industry full time, I have written extensively on both the business challenges and opportunities present in the field today. Thanks to

The Absurd Economics of Nutrition and Exercise

It’s fair to say that, to a large extent, America has long fostered a culture and environment conducive to physical inactivity and nutritional-based disease. With today’s prevailing science clearly showing that teaching and practicing lifestyle medicine significantly decreases the top chronic health conditions plaguing society—i.e., diabetes, obesity, heart disease and certain cancers—moving more firmly in this healthier, logical direction would subsequently trigger a vast increase in human productivity and output,

Dietary Supplements: Harmful or Essential? Cutting Through the Unrelenting Rhetoric

What a firestorm! Ever since Dr. Paul Offit’s book, “Do you Believe in Magic: The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine” was released last summer, there’s been a burst of new negative dietary supplement study results and position papers. Editorials, featuring provocative headlines such as: Enough is Enough: Stop Wasting Money on Vitamin and Mineral Supplements and Don’t Take Your Vitamins, have been published in prominent medical journals and major