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Alternative Medical Plan Blocked at Major University

Arthur J Pais in New York

The drug problem in America has more to do with medical doctors than the drug cartels in Colombia or Mexico, Dr Deepak Chopra often says, echoing the sentiments of many alternative medical practitioners that American doctors overprescribe drugs -- or prescribe drugs that make hardly any difference.

The likes of Dr Chopra and Dr Andrew Weil (author of The Spontaneous Healing) would have been happy to see a full pledged degree-granting alternative medical center at a major university.

But the plan to establish an alternative medical network, the first to be started by a university in the United States, has been put on a hold following bitter public fighting between the establishment and the alternative medical supporters at the State University of Stony Brook. The plan would have offered a slew of alternative medical regimes including ayurveda and Chinese and Tibetan herbal treatments.

Detailed studies about these would have been possible, thus ending the vilification by critics who say that alternative medicine makes easy and exaggerated claims, since the treatments are not scientifically studied in a proper medical environment. The medical network would have also taken firm steps to integrate Western and alternative medical treatments.

Though several medical schools and teaching hospitals in America offer a few courses on integrated medicine, the Stony Brook program was going to be a multimillion-dollar project that was going to be a model. Called the Independent Practice Association, the program would have in a few years granted degrees in alternative medicine. It would also negotiate with health insurance agencies for alternative medical treatment. Most insurance plans reject alternative medical treatments now.

Since the proposal was first suggested a year ago by Dr Samuel Brook, the head of Stony Brook's Center for Complementary/Alternative Medicine, many professors and administrators have opposed it, saying there should be a greater study of alternative medicine before such a radical step was taken.

Just as alternative medicine is steadily gaining support across America -- with an estimated $ 350 million spent yearly on Indian, Chinese, Tibetan and South American herbal remedies, acupuncture and similar treatments -- there is tremendous skepticism about it.

A New York-based publication called Alternative Medicine questions the claims of alternative medicine in articles written by doctors at top teaching hospitals and medical schools.

Every fourth American has reportedly tried alternative medicine, often without telling his or her physician.

"They do not tell the doctors because they are afraid the doctors will scold them," says Dr Naras Bhatt who uses traditional Western and Indian alternative medical treatments. "You are meant to walk using both legs," he says.

"The regular doctors often discourage alternative or complementary treatment because most often they have not studied the effects of herbal treatment -- or the vested interest of traditional medical business catches up."

At Stony Brook, the university's senate will have to meet and vote on the proposals for establishing IPA. Dr Norman Edelman, the dean of the medical school, told reporters on June 3 that experts from within the university "will have to tell me all the implications and ramifications of the IPA." He did not set up a time frame to take a decision.

But the supporters of alternative medicine feel they have lost a big battle. Dr Benjamin says he is not going to give up the fight. He has to take a few long breaths, meditate and then set up the fight for another battle, he adds.

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