The superb first premise of The Academy of World Integrated Medicines is that the very best medicine is a combination of medicines from around the world from all time. There is not and has not been ever in human history at any one time all over the planet one type of medicine alone. There is now what we might call ‘conventional Western Medicine,’ but even then the medicine of Germany might be different in some ways than the medicine of France or Argentina; although, they are quite similar. Yet there are big differences between them and then Traditional Chinese Medicine or Aryuvedic Medicine from India or the medicine of an Ayahuasca Shaman and Herbalist in the Amazon or the Greco-Roman-Hippocratic-Galenic-Avicenna’s Medicine practiced in the Middle East as Unani Tibb or the spirit medicine of the Greek Orthodox Magus of Stravolus. The superb second premise of The Academy of World Integrated Medicines is that each type of medicine has its particular range of effectiveness. That is, one medicine of many might be especially good for traumatic automobile accidents and another medicine might be especially good for irritable bowel syndrome, another for knee pain and another for suicidal depression. Yet, the integration, the blending of as many medicines as possible, the integration of medicine, will be the best medicine of all, with the greatest range of effectiveness. And figuring out which is which and what is better for what is a gigantic project for an ‘evidence based medicine’ that until now has only marginally investigated anything else but pharmaceuticals. Treatments and strategies that have been used well for a long time, might take a bit longer to test out in a lab, but, nonetheless, the evidence, albeit clinical-in-the-field evidence, a different kind of study with greater numbers than any lab and its funding source could handle; yet, however uncontrolled and out of lab those studies have been; still and all, why pass up what has worked for millennia waiting for the next research grant when local Chinese practitioner and peasant patient know from their incontrovertible bathroom evidence that “Essential Prescription for Pain and Diarrhea” does the job for Crohn’s forthwith? And what Western gastroenterologist would not want to know what formula that is — forthwith! You do not need the latest pharmaceutical, essentially because there is none, but you need what has worked more times than anyone could count. Yet, ‘World Integrated Medicine’ is itself problematic in us knowing exactly what it is. As scattershot as ‘Alternative Medicine,’ then ‘Complementary Medicine, became; as piecemeal and unplanned as ‘Integrated Medicine is; still and all, the future of medicine, the future of medicine around the world, may very well be a derivative of these, a truly integrated medicine. But, and a big ‘but’ it is, what is it and what shall it be? And, by the way, who knows and can tell us what it is? There is no shortage of would be visionaries; but does anyone see really, far off in some conceptual distance, even the outlines of what that figure, that magnificent statute appears to be, being barely perceptible through the wispy fog of confusions and a few research studies? How do we combine all those medicines; what works; what does not work; what works with what or not? It is, to say the least, not clear at all. Where then exactly is something called “World Integrated Medicine” located? There is no exactly; and it seems that nobody knows continentally the north, south, east and west of where World Integrated Medicine stands. It is all a work-in-progress — a w-i-p — a work of discovery, a work of exploration, a work-in-the-works. If a walk on the Earth Trail of ‘World Integrated Medicine’ starts with a few steps in Carrboro, North Carolina — where The Academy of World Integrated Medicines is starting, of course — heading in all directions, arriving sometime in the future in an integrated Katmandu and everywhere on the planet, The Academy of World Integrated Medicines is trotting alongside, carrying some of the luggage and burden and supplying a good deal of inspired teaching. We know it is a long walk. And we know we are not the only ones on this eclectic road. What national boundary are we passing next? Haiti? Nigeria? Bosnia? When will we see clearly what an integrated medicine is? A bit down the road. We will work at it to make progress towards it, to discover it, to use it; for the benefit of us all. Yes, “integrated medicine” is the watch word and it is sort of coming around but not yet. Approximately 75 university medical school programs in the United States have integrated medicine programs of one sort or another, yet, barely any are training integrated practitioners within their schools. Conceptually, Andrew Weil’s program at the University of Arizona comes closest, but it is relatively small with limited training possibilities and includes only post medical school fellows. At UCLA, for decades now, doctors have received training in acupuncture. At Harvard, there is now Japanese Acupuncture. So it exists, but has not gone very far. There are integrated clinics within many medical centers but they are not as much training integrated practitioners as bringing in alternative practitioners and putting them alongside conventional practitioners. This is a necessary and encouraging step, but still, we believe, limited in scope and future. While there may be all kinds of alternative practitioners at university medical centers working along side conventional practitioners; on the other hand, integrated trainings, for example, doctors learning Chinese herbs or Reiki practitioners learning emergency management techniques, are almost non-existent. Chiropractors learn chiropractic at chiropractic colleges; acupuncturists acupuncture at acupuncture schools; physicians at medical school learn Western conventional medicine; nurses at nursing school learn conventional nursing; and so on — and that is that with a few notable, if minor, exceptions. Integration happens only afterwards and not very thoroughly at that. Complete and thorough integrated training simply does not exist at all to our knowledge. A short acupuncture program at a chiropractic college does not really train the chiropractor in the judicious use of Chinese Medicine. Nor do the few hours in acupuncture school devoted to learning Western medicine allow the acupuncturist to prescribe antibiotics. Nor a weekend workshop in Mindfulness train a psychologist completely and competently in its practical clinical use. Practitioners are then required — and very few take this on — if they are interested in an alternative modality, say, for example, acupuncture, to register and do a complete program at an acupuncture college. This is simply too much for most working professionals. We intend to create practical and comprehensive programs for these interested professionals that trains them thoroughly but without having them go through unnecessary courses and change physical location or fly in countless weekends for workshops. Our type of online programs will go along way to changing that. In America, alternative medicine is big business; and, studies have shown that in some years more people visit alternative practitioners than conventional ones. And, on other sides of the world, far away geographically and culturally, in rural Indonesia, for example — and there are many, many such examples — the Healthy Mother Earth Foundation of Ibu Robin, mixes conventional midwifery and native herbs for poor women. Integrated medicine is coming along and is here to stay and will only grow. Yet, again, barely any society, certainly not Third World countries and their schools, are educating the physicians and nurses of the future in a ‘world integrated medicine.’
It appears that individual practitioners from different medical traditions are coming and work together. Yet, centers of learning where medical traditions are integrated, blended and unified are not available. We intend to be THE major center where integration and synthesis is available. Nobody appears interested in beating us to it. So we will be getting there first virtually and online by default.
