The Science Behind Integrative Medicine

In the past decade more and more of the modalities used in integrative medicine have been studied with the same standards as other “conventional” options. For this reason, your physician may be aware of CAM options for which there is science. But, because of the lack of standards or licensing in many of the areas, it remains the patient’s responsibility to question, gather information and research if he or she decides to add complementary or alternative modalities to his or her treatment plan.

There are a number of locations to research the science of complementary/integrative modalities.

• >M.D. Anderson Cancer Center has an extensive review of the science of complementary medicine broken down into specific areas at www.mdanderson.org/departments/cimer.
• >Natural Standard, an international research collaboration, provides evidence-based, peer-reviewed information on complementary and alternative modalities at www.naturalstandard.com.
• >The National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine provides research, information, and alerts at nccam.nih.gov.
• >UCLA Collaborative Centers for Integrative Medicine has an extensive listing of articles and research on integrative medicine at www.ccim.med.ucla.edu.