John Weeks

November 8, 2018

Integrative Health Publisher, Author, Educator and “Manifestor” Bonnie Horrigan Dies at 68

“Bonnie was one of integrative medicine’s grand behind the scenes ‘manifestors’ – she created the platforms for others to manifest their work.” Lori Knutson, RN, was reflecting on her close colleague Bonnie Horrigan who died November 4, 2018 of breast cancer. Horrigan was 68. Through founding one of the first peer review journals in the field in 1996, publicizing integrative medicine in a series of reports for the Bravewell Collaborative and more recently connecting her colleagues at the Academic Consortium for Integrative Medicine and Health through their newsletter, this characterization of Horrigan’s contributions rings continuously through the last quarter century.
November 5, 2018

FDA Violates Core Principles in Removing Natural Agents from Compounding

The principle of using the least invasive methods first – a corollary of “first do no harm” – is central to integrative health and medicine. Also core is the idea of patient-centered, functionally-oriented outcomes. Each of these principles is being chucked out the window as the FDA is systematically removing multiple natural agents from an approved list for compounding pharmacists.
November 1, 2018

Pictures at an Exhibition: Perspectives on the 2018 Society for Integrative Oncology Conference

I have covered developments of the Society for Integrative Oncology over the 19 years since the organization placed its flag squarely in the emerging, evidence-based integrative medicine era. Many of its accomplishments have been remarkable for the broader integrative medicine field. SIO has had success in creating guidelines that have been endorsed by conventional oncology organizations. Internally, the organization has, since its beginning, fostered an interprofessional environment that has, for instance, included naturopathic physicians in the presidency and leading its marquis integrative breast cancer guideline initiative. I’d never attended their conference until this year when I was one of 380 souls at the October 27-29, 2019 conference in Phoenix. Here are some impressions. Credit the 19th century composer Mussorgsky for the title.
October 26, 2018

Two Real World Illuminations of Patients’ Experience of Healing and Health

Organizations connected to two of the most significant researchers in the movement for integrative health and healing, Brian Berman, MD and Wayne Jonas, MD, held separate events recently to announce reports that offer insight into patients’ experience of health and healing. Samueli Integrative Health Programs, which Jonas directs, examined patient views of health in the context of their relationships with their primary care doctors. Berman’s Institute for Health and Healing – in collaboration with the Institute for Functional Medicine – dove deeply into selected patients’ perceptions of what their “healing journey”  to develop a model. Both examinations highlight processes not typically part of the clinical encounter.  Outcomes illuminate potential characteristics of a system focused on health creation.