- John Weeks, Writer, Speaker, Change Agent. Click below to subscribe to the Integrator
- johnweeks@theintegratorblog.com
academic medicine
December 2, 2018
In May of 2018 at the top global research meeting for integrative health and medicine, two academic leaders with medical cannabis practices organized an informal breakfast round-table. One co-convenor helping guide dialogue in the overflow room was Leslie Mendoza Temple, MD. The past chair of the politically-killed Illinois Medical Cannabis Advisory Board brought more than personal reflection to the attendees. Temple had performed a comprehensive chart review on the first 166 medical cannabis patients certified in the practice. Her findings, recently published, and her reflections on now 650 patients – plus the curious politics of cannabis in her state – will be eye-opening for practitioners tracking medical cannabis developments.
October 2, 2018
On September 26, 2018, Harvard Medical School announced to its faculty that it is “reassessing” the School’s mission statement. An invitation to comment and provide feedback on a draft of a new mission was sent by microbiology and immunology professor Peter Howley, MD. Howley leads a committee for Medical School Dean George Daley, MD, PhD that is wrestling with a transformational theme that most unifies the diverse parties in the movement for integrative health and medicine. Harvard is bellying up toward reckoning with the need to shift the medical industry toward a system for creating health.
August 22, 2018
The movement from the wild-west of “alternative” medical practices into mainstream respect and inclusion is typically a process of standard-setting, self-regulation, and then governmental action. Two principals in the Osher Collaborative for Integrative Medicine recently asked whether – with the chaotic and rapid expansion of the field — its time for integrative medical doctors, in particular, to consider additional, proactive steps.
July 10, 2018
If one views “integrative health and medicine” as an organic movement, then its shape consists of the stories documenting its milestones and the work of its pioneers. Only the telling of these stories are less likely to be around a fire than around the modern substitute: the web. This article offers three slices of achievement. It involves multiple streams among those that flow together to support an integrative future: a milestone in academic medicine in the dominant school, for naturopathic medicine, and a changing of the guard for direct entry (homebirth) midwifery.