Complementary medicine in the hospital
CMAJ 1998;158:1270
After reading a recent article by Anita Elash, "Move into hospital sector another sign of complementary medicine's growing popularity" (CMAJ 1997;157[11]:1589-10 2 [full text / en bref]), I thought of Dickens' observation that we live in the best of times and the worst of times. In these closing years of the 20th century, physicians enjoy the results of the last 70 or 80 years of scientifically based medical practice, and there is a strong impetus to pursue evidence-based practice as much as possible. At the same time, our society — and physicians are part of society — is drowning in a tidal wave of irrationalism. Leaving aside the public appetite for astrology and the like, we can focus on the issues of prime importance to physicians: most (but not all) of the beliefs and practices described by the terms alternative and complementary medicine.
According to the article, Sunnybrook Health Science Centre in Toronto now allows all manner of professional and nonprofessional staff to practise "techniques such as aromatherapy, iridology, reflexology and magnetic therapy as part of a patient's regular care." A long time ago, I spent a rewarding year as a senior medical intern at Sunnybrook. It was only a hospital then and not a "health science centre," so we didn't have all these wonderful complementary therapies.
The article reports that Dr. Donald Livingston thinks that if these therapies are not offered in hospitals, we are denying patients access to them. This is nonsense. What we are doing by making them available in hospitals is lending them an aura of scientific respectability.
Our forebears must be rolling in their graves.
Paul C.S. Hoaken, MD
Bath, Ont.
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