endod, or 'soap berry ' plant, well known to traditional healers, is being studied as a natural control of the fresh-water mollusks, mollusks which spread the parasitic disease schistosomiasis, found in many parts of Africa
The philosophical approach of holistic health has always been one that made more sense to me.
To be clear, while my paying job is in the field of conventional medicine, I have often felt conflicted or dissatisfied with the limits of conventional medicine, not because I think it is not effective, but because I think in most settings I've seen at least, its approach, or focus, is limited.
I've often pondered why it seems limited.
The best explanation I can give is that it is directed by doctors; ie its power structure is a top-down one with the pharmaceutical/surgical and other such 'scientific' options for diagnosis and treatment being accepted as the viewpoint that directs health care.
That in itself is contradictory, because doctors are rarely involved in true 'health' care, ie, helping healthy people stay healthy. They are actually most often and most profitably employed in diagnosing and treating illness.
However, so often health problems an individual has cannot be diagnosed or treated from the mechanistic/objective scientific perspective of the doctors. A more global approach would discover that the individual's physical complaints are minor symptoms only of a larger spiritual/emotional/energetic dysfunction.
Any nurse will tell you that certain personalities seem to go with the certain ailments that we see on a regular basis. Obviously, we would be hard pressed to say which came first, the chicken or the egg, but I'll say it here: we do roll our eyes if we hear an individual with certain diagnoses will be in our care, knowing we will have a very predictable set of difficult/unhealthy behaviors to contend with as well.
So, I ask myself, knowing as much as we do about the physiological responses to certain states of mind (eg. stress releases certain stress hormones which have profound physical effects on the body), should there not be more study of the mind/emotions/spirit/energy fields of human beings and should the emphasis not shift from the medical/mechanical model to one that encompasses more alternative approaches?
There seems to exist no way for an individual to find health care without shopping piece-meal for alternative therapies and/or choosing to enter our present health care system as it is now, driven by the medical/scientific approach, ie with a medical doctor as pretty much the only gateway.
I'd love to know more about places where the more global/holistic attitude and philosophy are used to deliver health care!
random relatedness:
music and healing ceremonies of the Zar traditions of Ethiopia and Sudan, Pacific Review of Ethnomusicology, UCLA
Zar cults of Ethipia and SudanPriestess, mother, sacred sister: religions dominated by women,by Susan Starr Sered
Impacts of Urbanisation on the Traditional Medicine of Ethiopia, by
Wondwosen Teshome-Bahiru,
Anthropologist, 8(1): 43-52 (2005)
The Role of indigenous Medicinal Plants in Ethiopian Health Care, Fekkadu Fullas, Holler Africa
The impact of objects and landscape on psychological health in the immigrant experience, Salman Akhtar on TVO.ORG/Video/Big Ideas
"Can Aboriginal Traditional Knowledge Survive in the Modern World?" Leanne Simpson on TVO.ORG/Video/Big Ideas
How the medical and legal systems are failing in the so-called war on drugs, Gabor Mate on TVO.ORG/Video/Big Ideas
The Hundred Year Lie, How to Protect Yourself from the Chemicals that Are Destroying Your Health, by Randall Fitzgerald
The Path of Practice: A Woman's Book of Ayurvedic Healing, by Bri Maya Tiwari
Spontaneous Healing: How to Discover and Enhance Your Body's Natural Ability to Maintain and Heal Itself, by Dr. Andrew Weil
Why People Don't Heal and How They Can, by Caroline M. Myss
Rules for Getting Well and Staying Well, a simple list
Are You Getting Enlightened Or Losing Your Mind?: How To Master Everyday And Extraordinary Spiritual Experiences, by Dennis Gersten
HealthyOntario, our provincial government site which provides information on conventional medicine and services for Ontarians
Listings Canada: Ontario: Health: Alternative
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