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Complementary/Alternative Medicine

Everything that physicians know about how well treatments work is based on evidence. A treatment cannot be claimed to be beneficial unless it is demonstrated. A study must show that fewer people die or have complications with this new treatment than with the usual treatment. If a study has a huge number of subjects randomized to either the experimental group or the control group and results show no difference in morbidity and mortality between the two groups, then the treatment has no additional benefit.
Because of the need to demonstrate minimized risk and maximized benefit for treatments, the FDA has a set of standards and documentation requirements. A pharmaceutical company would spend years developing a new drug that can be approved. Even if it does get approved, the manufacturer still has to follow quality standards, producing the drug in a way that every single unit of the product is exactly the same as the next with virtually no variation in the actual dose and content. With these standards and the money that goes into research, development, and marketing of a new drug, pharmaceutical products can be expensive.

Complementary and Alternative Medicine

The various CAM therapies, such as herbs and acupuncture, arise through exploration and discovery, probably no different from conventional medicine. The prime difference between the two is in scientific study. CAM therapies usually do not have research to back up claims of benefit. A lot of the time, the evidence is anecdotal. One might be told that a particular supplement is good because the person saying so experienced a perceived benefit. If more people say the same thing or there is an advertisement for it using buzzwords like "all-natural" and "energetic," then one might be more convinced.
Unlike conventional medicine, these therapies are not subject to the process of FDA approval. They may not necessarily have quality standards with manufacturing. If, for example, an herbal supplement is distributed by grinding a specific plant and putting it into bottles, one cannot expect every bottle to be exactly like the next one. One bottle may have too little of the active ingredient for the claimed benefit to be noticed while the next bottle may have too much and possibly cause risks. CAM therapies are cheap, but this is usually why they are so.

Safety Tips

There are always going to be arguments going in both directions. While complementary and alternative medicine may stay around for some time, conventional therapy should not be ignored. When using any CAM therapy, it may be helpful to let the regular doctor know. After all, without scientific study of CAM therapies, there may be effects that are not yet known. Maybe the therapy can mysteriously interact with a conventional medicine treatment in a way that lowers the efficacy or increases the risks. One might argue that anything natural is good, but don't forget that snake venom and poisonous mushrooms are also natural. The word "natural" just tells where it came from.
In the end, the choice is up

source:at Suite101: Complementary/Alternative Medicine: Compromising With the Conventional | Suite101.com http://anthony-lee.suite101.com/complementaryalternative-medicine-a23145#ixzz3qBFAHuPA