Reiki, Qi Gong, Hawthorn:
The New Language of American Medicine?
A $6.7 million five-year grant from the National Institutes
of Health to the University of Michigan will allow Steven F.
Bolling, M.D. and Sara L. Warber, M.D. to begin answering a
$20 billion question: Are the Americans who happily spend enormous
amounts of their hard-earned cash for herbs, vitamins, bio-energy
recovery techniques and a host of other health aids that have
come to be known as "complementary and alternative medicine"
getting their money's worth?
The U-M Health System's new NIH-funded Complementary and Alternative
Medicine Research Center is one of 13 such centers around the
country and the only one dedicated to understanding the effects
of complementary and alternative medicine on cardiovascular
disease.
"We want research studies on these therapies with good,
statistically analyzable data that are publishable," says
Bolling, who is a professor of cardiac surgery in the Medical
School. "Whether we show that it works or not, it's good
for Western medicine.
Four research projects will be launched in the first year to
study the effects of complementary and alternative medicine
on:
- Wound healing and post-operative pain in coronary bypass
surgery
- Post-operative recovery following cardiac surgery
- Congestive heart failure
- Ability to walk in diabetic patients with autonomic and
peripheral neuropathy who have cardiovascular disease
The complementary and alternative practices to be examined
include a traditional Chinese medical practice known as Qi Gong,
which is the transfer of energy fields to promote faster healing.
Researchers will look at Qi Gong as a healing procedure after
coronary by-pass surgery.
Researchers will also investigate the effect of spirituality
and religiosity following cardiac surgery on post-operative
recovery. Earlier preliminary research on this subject at Michigan
indicated that patients with strong belief systems had better
recovery outcomes.
A dietary supplement extracted from the flowers and leaves
of the hawthorn tree will be evaluated as a treatment for congestive
heart failure. Hawthorn is widely used in Europe and preliminary
studies indicate that it is both safe and effective.
A bio-energy transfer technique known as Reiki will be studied
for its effects on diabetic patients.
The NIH grant includes funds for publication of results, creation
of statistical databases, curriculum development, research fellowships
and a national symposium in the fourth year of the study.
"The reality of complementary and alternative medicine
is two-fold in the U.S. right now," Bolling says. "We
know that people are using it — to the tune of $10-$20 billion
a year — and that they often don't inform their doctors.
We also know that there is little good, hard scientific data
to document whether these treatments work, whether they cause
harm, whether they do nothing at all. We want to study them,
examine mechanisms and publish results using sound scientific
methods."
"Probably 30-40 percent of all the patients a physician
sees are using some type of complementary or alternative medicine,"
says Warber, who is a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar and
a lecturer in internal medicine in the Medical School. "We
want to be able to provide evidence-based education for these
health care professionals so that they can counsel their patients
in a sensitive and responsible manner."
You may contact Steven Bolling at sbolling@umich.edu
You may contact Sara Warber at swarber@umich.edu
 
|
