Conventional Versus Natural Medicine



What is the difference between conventional and natural medicine? A whole world of philosophy and outlook.


Conventional Medicine

* Emphasizes diagnosis and treatment.
* Views the mind and body as separate, with little effect on each other.
* Views the body as essentially a machine with disease resulting when parts break.
* Views medicine as a military campaign. Seeks better weapons” to "combat" disease.
* Views the body as the passive recipient of treatments that "fix" it.
* Patients obey doctors' orders.
* Primary treatments include pharmaceuticals, surgery and radiation.
* Focuses on disease.
* Focuses on pain.
* Focuses on suffering, the human experience of pain.


Natural Medicine

* Emphasizes disease prevention.
* Views the mind and body as one, the "body-mind." Anything that affects one affects the other.
* Views the body as a living microcosm of the universe, with disease resulting when forces that act on it become unbalanced.
* Views medicine as an effort to restore mind/body harmony.
* Views the body as capable of self-repair and administers treatments to support self-healing.
* Individuals take an active role in their healing.
* Primary treatments include diet, exercise, stress management, social support and herbal medicines.
* Focuses on illness, the human experience of disease.
* Focuses on suffering, the human experience of pain.
* Goal is healing, the individual’s experience of physical, mental and spiritual wholeness.


From the book: Nature’s Cures by Michael Castleman



Back to Natural Health and Healing


Home



Enjoy this page? Please pay it forward. Here's how...

Would you prefer to share this page with others by linking to it?

  1. Click on the HTML link code below.
  2. Copy and paste it, adding a note of your own, into your blog, a Web page, forums, a blog comment, your Facebook account, or anywhere that someone would find this page valuable.