Can Complementary Medicine Work Side by Side with Traditional Medicine?

I think it is absolutely right that people do whatever they feel will help them to better health and if that is using complementary medicine alongside allopathic medicine then I see no problem in this. All forms of medicine should be working to the same end, and no one route may be enough, so the allopathic route may help the symptoms while the complementary route, may address the cause, or vice versa. Usually the first of those is the way.

Therapies work very well together and will be addressing problems in a different way, but the ultimate reason for using either method must be solely for the restoration of health to the best it can be for the person concerned.

Doctors have the ultimate responsibility for their patients’ health but because many have little or no knowledge of complementary medicine, it is unfair for a patient to ask the doctor for their opinion if they should combine the two. It is also wrong for a complementary therapist acting in that role to dissuade a patient to not seek their doctors’ advice.

It is also very wrong for either approach to denigrate the people involved in that persons care. Many doctors will view complementary medicine as quackery, but I think you only have to ask the many that use it as either the only option or as a complement to the standard approach and they vote with their feet.

It of course would be so much better if the two approaches conversed with mutual respect.