Use of unconventional medicine by physicians

The Hippocratic oath updated indicates that the physician must respect "all persons [...] without any discrimination based on their status or their beliefs. Thus, even if not agree with unconventional medicine, a doctor may very well be used to meet the patient's beliefs. The use of unconventional medicine by a doctor, possibly within a hospital, is not a form of validation of the method. From a pragmatic point of view, as the method provides well-being and comfort to the patient, the doctor can use it even if it is satisfied that the effect is just placebo (conventional medicine also uses Frequently placebos). In the same vein, the presence of places of worship and chaplaincy in a hospital does not indicate that the nursing staff is a believer, but he respects the beliefs of patients and agrees to implement everything that is not harmful and brings comfort.

Nothing prevents a physician from practicing medicine unconventional. Their practice is not reserved for doctors. Many allied health professionals use them. They may be offered by persons who are not physicians or paramedics (nurses, physiotherapists, etc.;). Faces to the diversity of these unconventional practices with practitioners very heterogeneous attempts to regulations and controls are trying to implement.

A prior conception

According to some non-conventional medicine share a priori conception of the mechanisms of the human body and disease. For example,

* Energy medicine (acupuncture, Qigong, Shiatsu ...) assumes that it has a vital influx (prana in India, Ki in Japanese or Qi in Chinese) which flows harmoniously, the sickness is a disturbance this harmony should be re-balanced.

* Homeopathy is based on the principles:
No evil comes from a problem inherent to the person, the "field", and this field must be treated;

No treatment is done according to the principle of similarity: administering a substance known to cause a symptom that treat symptoms;

No longer a product is diluted and "energized" (vigorously shaken) is more active;

* Osteopathy assumes that the disorder stems from a blockage of anatomical structures between them, a malfunction "mechanical." It is based on four principles: the structure governs function, the model structure, the unity of body, and the artery is supreme.

Conventional medicine is based on the facts. It carries out a treatment if its effectiveness is proven (superiority over the natural healing and the placebo effect). The theory used to explain the effectiveness is subject to verification that there is an effective therapy. Thus, we used aspirin and penicillin without knowing the mechanism of therapeutic action of these substances. The explanation of their action would change with new discoveries, this would not alter their effectiveness.

In general, the fact that a theory, a prior conception, either true or false is independent of the result and can explain a fact by a false theory, and the fact that the theory is false does not being true. For example, in the Middle Ages, knew how to make iron and soap, however, the theory that explained the transformations of matter, alchemy, was generally false.

So:

* If it is proved that the theory underlying a given medicine is wrong, this does not mean that the treatments associated with this medicine is ineffective;
* The fact that treatment is effective does not mean valid medical theory which justifies it.
* Evidence of effectiveness should be compared with natural healing and a placebo on a sufficient number of cases that we can have a statistically significant difference.

Semantic complexities of the name

The term alternative medicine is the term adopted by the European Commission to qualify the alternative therapies that are the subject of a growing recognition in Europe since the 1990s.



It also uses the term alternative medicine, complementary medicine, natural medicine, alternative medicine, alternative medicine or holistic medicine sometimes (as some claim to treat the body as a whole).

* Speaking of "alternative medicine" seems to imply that there are two conceptions of medicine involving two health care systems operate independently of one another, with the same degree of efficiency and scientific nature: patients would therefore choose between two therapies they may consider as alternatives or as complementary and competing one another.

* The term "alternative medicine" seems to regard the aggressive practices of conventional medicine.

* The term "alternative medicine", it is envisaged these care practices as a proxy, therefore, likely to replace conventional and conventional therapeutic approach.

* The term "holistic" criticizes conventional medicine to focus on treating an organ or a specific function and not the patient as a whole. This is probably the case for medical specialties but not always for medicine in general.

* The term "complementary medicine" rather favors the idea of combining treatments that may be "therapeutic philosophies" different but able to cooperate in the interest of the patient.

By playing this way on the vocabulary, the proponents of these treatments were able to enter the culture the idea that they presented an "alternative" treatments whose effectiveness is proven by scientific research, where Sceptics prefer to speak rather of medicine based on science (an English science-based medicine) and pseudo-medicine and pseudo-science in order to avoid this rhetorical effect.

A semantic reversal has also been made since medicine is designated by advocates of unconventional medicine by the term allopathic medicine.

Alternate Medicine

The term alternative medicine refers to the West a variety of treatment methods that are not based on the experimental method, one of the foundations of the scientific approach to the facts. They are based on centuries-old traditions sometimes or practices that emerged in the nineteenth century, but generally before the advent of evidence-based medicine (in English: Evidence-based medicine). The non-conventional medicines are therefore considered non-scientific.



Depending on the country, their traditions and their laws, they may be common (Denmark, Germany, Switzerland and England ...), tolerated (as in France and some Latin countries) or be banned. They are often preventive, and build on the relationship of trust with the patient, expressing a personal search and the search for a framework of care that is outside the frameworks of modern medicine.

Some techniques are used by doctors or paramedics, other allied health practitioners in various ("health practitioners" in Germany and Switzerland, under the control of the state), and others by practitioners whose quality of training is not subject to a state diploma and can hardly be assessed, are based on assumptions not validated experimentally. They develop as a complement or alternative to conventional medicine.

The non-conventional medicine are not recognized by much of science, particularly by those belonging to the contemporary skeptic movement.

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