Applied Life Studies

This is the first comprehensive, multidisciplinary book to focus on the ethical challenges of complementary and alternative medicine. It examines the ethical challenges that CAM raises for patients and their physicians, and for patient-physician relationships. The book is written by a multidisciplinary team of CAM ethics and policy analysts, researchers and thought-leaders who present a forward-looking exploration of their subject.

A practical, evidence-based guide to complementary cancer therapies with an emphasis on enhancing practice; that is, using the therapies alongside conventional medicine, rather than as alternatives to it.

This book investigates the ways in which the evidence base is influencing complementary and alternative medicine in general and Ayurveda and allied health practices in particular. The latter have traditionally been prevalent in Asia and are now increasingly attracting interest worldwide. The book is divided into four sections, the first of which examines issues related to acquisition and evaluation of the evidence base. Evidence-based approaches to Ayurvedic diagnosis and therapy are then examined, with a special focus on management of cardiovascular and rheumatological diseases, dental care, and rejuvenating treatments. The final section explores further the challenges of applying evidence-based practice in contemporary and alternative medicine and Ayurveda with a focus upon the issues requiring urgent attention in ongoing decade. The same involves encompassing areas such as Ayurvedic pharmaceutics, practice, education and research within an evidence-based perspective.

This text tells the surprising story of how complementary and alternative medicine, CAM, entered biomedical and evangelical Christian mainstreams despite its roots in non-Christian religions and the lack of scientific evidence of its efficacy and safety.

This volume includes the full Health Technology Assessment (HTA) report on effectiveness, appropriateness, safety and costs of homoeopathy in health care. The report was commissioned by the Swiss health authorities to inform decision-making on the further inclusion of homoeopathy in the list of services covered by statutory health insurance. Other studies carried out as part of the Swiss Complementary Medicine Evaluation Programme (PEK) caused a massive stir due to their schematic and exclusively quantitative (negative-)outcomes for homoeopathy. The present report, in contrast, offers a differentiated evaluation of the practice of homoeopathy in health care. It confirms homoeopathy as a valuable addition to the conventional medical landscape - a status it has been holding for a long time in practical health care.  

Rather than physiological health only, complementary and alternative medicines aim at the production of wellbeing. This book explores how the increasing proliferation of holistic health methods are intimately connected with changing configurations of selfhood, gender and class.