Eastern and Western medicine united on Tuesday, May 5, 1998 as the Dalai Lama, the exiled head of Tibetan Buddhism, met with doctors at the Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan to discuss how best to meld western knowledge of brain biology with Eastern wisdom about the nature of the mind. All participants in attendance, which included physicians, researchers, meditation experts from across the United States, and the Dalai Lama were treated to a display of the latest new-age techniques and technology related to the study and continued exploration of the brain. Researchers have been working for decades to find new ways to train the brain to use different regions to compensate for areas that have been damaged. Western medicine has notoriously rejected the notion that spirituality plays a role in healing. Several doctors in attendance at the summit were pleased to report that the meeting helped to foster discussion on the effectiveness of spirituality in daily medicine. Researchers primarily discussed the effects that alternative medicine techniques such as yoga and biofeedback had on the mind; also the benefit they did This fall, Beth Israel will begin clinical studies of patients using Eastern healing techniques in combination with conventional treatment. The following institutions already have established alternative medicine clinics and have experimented with mind-oriented healing methods: Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Boston, Stanford University, and Duke University.

Source: New York Magazine, May 11, 1998

RECITE YOUR MANTRA AND CALL ME IN THE MORNING

New York's medical Establishment is finally recognizing the healing power of mind-body techniques like meditation as a result of new developments in neuroscience and hefty donations from believers. Following the meeting of about 50 neuroscientists and biologists, along with the 14th Dalia Lama, Matthew Fink, president and CEO of Beth Israel, expressed his hope that the Dalai Lama will one day allow neuroscientists to monitor his brain waves as he enters a state of deep meditation. Said Fink: "We want to hook him up." The Dalai Lama has not consented to this procedure just yet, however. Yet, the Dalai Lama's influence can be heard throughout New York city as three of the city's most prestigious institutions-Beth Israel Medical Center, Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center-have announced ambitious plans for "integrative" or "complementary" programs that would include mind-body medicine. However, Columbia-Presbyterian's Department of Complementary Care Services is the only one of New York's hospitals' alternative medicine programs that is currently running at full steam. New York City has been slow to accept alternative medicine techniques in contrast to the rest of the country; programs have been flourishing for years at major centers around the country. The furthering of complementary health care, the combination of both eastern and western medicine tenets in treating a vast array of mental and physical health conditions, is gaining strength in New York. In fact, complementary care may be the wave of the future. Cutting-edge science is reinforcing the notion that thinking the right thoughts can help cure illness. Advances in the understanding of the brain's chemical mechanisms have caused doctor's to take a second look at ancient practices like meditation and more modern practices like biofeedback. Mind-body researchers believe that meditation can influence patients' levels of neuropeptides and serotonin in their bodies and thereby make their immune systems function better. Just how these techniques might accomplish this is still a subject of heated debate. The five major alternative therapies gaining much acceptance in New York are biofeedback, meditation, guided imagery, cognitive therapy, and support-group therapy.

Source: Newsday, August 6, 1998

The medical world was shaken by a 1993 study by Harvard physician David Eisenberg that found more than a third of Americans use massage, acupuncture or other unconventional therapies. Surprisingly, according to the study, Americans pay more visits to chiropractors, acupuncturists, hypnotists and other alternative therapists than to family practitioners. This study has been called, "the turning point" for alternative medicine in western society. The emergence of alternative medicine coincides with the recent trend in manage care companies and Health Maintenance Organizations (HMO's) becoming receptive to less expensive medical approaches. Just prior to the advent of the new Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine at Stony Brook, the center conducted a survey of Suffolk residents last year, finding that more than 40 percent have sought alternative treatments, and more than two-thirds were interested in receiving those services at the medical center. A "small minority" of dissenters criticized Stony Brook's endeavor; one anonymous faculty member stated, "Many of us are strongly opposed to giving these therapies an aura of respectability by bringing them into an academic medical center." Despite some opposition by a few stubborn, narrow-minded physicians, Stony Brook's Center is reportedly thriving.

Contrary to popular conception, there is much in mainstream medicine that is based on unproven therapies, according to Dr. Benjamin, 50, a Bronx-born physician recruited as director from a large Phoenix health center that he founded as a model of integrated medicine.

Benjamin also stated, quoting a former president of the American Medical Association, that 60 percent of prescriptions are written for purposes other than those for which they were tested The recent emergence of alternative medicine is remarkable because it is being driven by consumers rather than the medical establishment or the insurance industry. Whether you are a proponent of alternative/eastern medicine or not, you must either satisfyingly or begrudgingly admit that alternative medicine is on the rise!

Alternative medicine: Hope or hype? Experts spar on therapies ranging from herbal potions to acupuncture