By Yervand Kondrahjiyan | Staff Writer
The human body is a fragile and often irreparable asset that should be taken care of. Throughout history, sick people have resorted to different treatment methods, such as taking chemical medications or changing lifestyle to preserve their well-being. But recently, alternative medicine, a different method for the treatment of diseases, has emerged. This way of healing has been gaining great popularity, especially in countries where conventional treatment might pose a great financial burden on patients. Moreover, many people seek such healing because they are scared of pharmaceutical drugs. Such people claim that alternative medicine cures them of almost all diseases. But do alternative medicines really work when compared to conventional medicine?
What is alternative medicine?
Alternative medicine- also referred to as integrative or complementary medicine- refers to medical treatments adopted instead of conventional therapies.
Types of Alternative Medicine
Over the years, alternative healing practices have become popular worldwide as more and more people become interested in natural healing.
Ø Traditional alternative medicine includes the more conventional forms of therapy, such as acupuncture, homeopathy, and oriental practices.
Ø Healing by touch Through manual treatment, such as massage, yoga or body movement therapies, the body can focus on healing at the site of injury as other parts are brought back to optimal health.
Ø Diet and herbs are commonly used nowadays to balance the body’s nutritional well-being.
Ø External energy, such as Reiki and electromagnetic theory, is believed by some to affect a person’s health.
Ø Therapies using the mind, such as meditation and hypnosis, allegedly improve people’s mental health and help them heal better.
Ø Therapies incorporating senses, such as dance, art and music can affect people’s overall health.
Ø Aromatherapy is based on the use of aromatic materials, such as essential oils. The healing essential oils can be used as topical application, massage, inhalation or water immersion.
Ø Herbal medicines are one type of dietary supplements, sold as tablets, capsules, powder, teas, or extracts. They are believed to help people improve their overall health.
A branch of pharmacology related to alternative medicine called pharmacognosy focuses on studying natural products from various sources including plants, bacteria, fungi, and marine organisms. Although it is somehow ignored nowadays as a major subject area within the modern pharmacy curricula, especially in the West, its role in the discovery and development of new drugs and therapies should not be undermined.
Many pharmaceuticals, including aspirin, digoxin, oral anticoagulants, and some Antiparasitics were originally derived from plants. In addition, about 25 percent of all pharmaceutical drugs still contain some plant-derived constituents.
The increasing need for herbal medicines necessitates a special maintenance of these products. The quality of herbals can be affected by different physical, chemical, geographical factors. Therefore, different chemical and phytochemical test, analytical techniques, and hyphenated analytical techniques are administered to assure the quality aspects of herbal medicines. Many herbs with little to no short-term toxicity can have severe effects if taken over long periods. Herbs can be misidentified or wrongly prescribed by poorly trained herbalists.
Conventional medicine and alternative therapies can and should coexist. They have different strengths and can both be used efficiently to target specific medical problems. People can seek alternative medicine because of the fear of antibiotics or the side effects of conventional medicine. However, conventional medicine is also extremely useful and better suited for serious health issues. The best situation would be for alternative therapies to be used to support and complement conventional medicine.
References
Johns Hopkins Medicine, based in Baltimore, Maryland. , based in Baltimore, Maryland. (2021, September 30). Retrieved November 7, 2021, from https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/.
Sarker, S. D. (2012, April). Pharmacognosy in modern pharmacy curricula. Pharmacognosy magazine. Retrieved November 7, 2021, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3371443/.