Cleveland Clinic New Chinese Herb Program Makes Huge Waves in Media
Guest Post by John Weeks
The Time Magazine feature “Cleveland Clinic’s New Medicine” was here. The Wall Street Journal‘s “A Top Hospital Opens to Chinese Herbs as Medicines” is here. “Can Herbs Help? Dr. Oz Explains Eastern Medicine” is here. Katie Couric’s Today show piece on it, “Why One Hospital is Turning to Chinese Medicine” is here. Crane Herb Company will be the supplier of the products. Crane sources their supplies via KPC Herbs, which requires the most rigorous testing of herbs in that category, according to Crane officials. Couric’s Today show segment included a series of leading questions that promoted integrative care. Cleveland Clinic lists a broad array of conditions for which they argue that the herbs may be useful. Notably, the American Botanical Council took on Time for its fallacious assertion that there are no regulations for herbs.
Comment: The Couric show featured interviews with a Yale-based integrative medical doctor, David Katz, MD, MPH, and Pina LoGiudici, ND, LAc who fielded her lobs. Following the interview, Katz wrote an exceptional piece in Huffington Post on how to think about evidence in the integrative dialogue. The Cleveland Clinic move, and Crane Herbs work behind the scenes, created a huge jolt of generally friendly integrative health media.
This article originally appeared in The Integrator Blog.
Weeks’ Integrator Blog News & Reports and monthly Integrator Round-up are considered top sources on policy, business and academic developments for the field. He is also executive director of Academic Consortium for Complementary and Alternative Health Care (ACCAHC) where he directs the Center for Optimal Integration: Creating Health. He speaks widely on the policy, business and history of the movement for integrative health and medicine.
FON: THE BUSINESS OF INTEGRATIVE HEALTH + MEDICINE
