Nice article about holistic medicine

PetConnection had a great article today that echoes the message about holistic medicine that I've been trying to promote through the Holistic Club. Not sure how successful I've been, but I try....

Holistic Care: 22 years in 500 words

By Christie Keith

April 12, 2008

Once upon a time, I had a cat who suffered from flea allergies. He’d been on steroids for ten years, had tumors in his ears, and spent the late summer hairless and covered in scabs.

I was browsing in the book section of a pet supply store, and opened Dr. Pictairn’s Complete Guide to Natural Health for Dogs and Cats. “We need to look at the whole picture of an illness and find therapies that will work with the whole body – not against it – in the healing process,” I read. “To me, that is what constitutes a true cure. I often use the term ‘holistic’ to describe this approach to medicine. Unlike many who use the word, I do not equate it with ‘natural’, for it is certainly possible to use natural methods such as herbs, vitamins, and exercise but still fail to see the overall picture of what is happening.”

What is needed, he said, “Is an entirely new understanding, not just the substitution of a vitamin for an antibiotic, or a mineral for a hormone.”

I changed my cat’s diet to one of the homemade recipes in Dr. Pitcairn’s book, and he never itched again. Then I switched my other cats, and began an exploration of natural and holistic medicine that’s lasted until today.

Which is why it comes as such a shock to so many of my holistic brethren when I go on one of my semi-patented diatribes against people who won’t do diagnostic testing or use antibiotics. “Christie,” they mutter darkly, “isn’t holistic enough.”

But you know what? I think I’m more holistic than they are. Because holistic isn’t about the substances you use; it’s about how you think.

It’s about looking at the whole animal and his or her whole environment, genetics, and lifestyle. It’s about making the best, most informed decision possible using all available resources, the one that relieves suffering and illness without doing harm. Balancing risk and benefit. Not seeing the animal as a collection of parts, but as a living creature in a dynamic environment.

And no, it’s not always easy, but with practice and knowledge it becomes easier. You learn to stretch your mind and stop mindlessly applying band aids to gaping wounds, be those band aids an herb or an antibiotic. You learn to stop dismissing a modality out of hand just because it doesn’t fit in with your preconceived notions.

Don’t get me wrong. Skepticism is good. In fact, when you start talking to the snake oil salesmen from Big Pharma and the herbal supplement industry, I’d say it’s essential. But knee-jerk skepticism is bad. Making your mind up and shutting out new information, new evidence, and facts you don’t like? Very, very bad.

Herbert Spencer once said, “There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance – that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”

That principle works both ways.

*note the Holistic Club's fancy new logo, created by a fantastic local designer- but hey, I'm biased ;-)

Break time!

I survived this last round of exams, and while my GPA took a hit in some classes, I actually fared pretty well in Pathology. Yay!

Aside from exams, I've been getting some good work done with the Holistic Club. We had a speaker come in to talk about avian acupuncture (yes, it can be done- but usually by injecting a little bit of an irritating substance at the acupuncture point rather than by keeping needles in). We already have our next talk lined up ("Paradigm Shift and Oriental Medicine in Veterinary Medicine"), and actually have another talk scheduled after that. I saw an article about some new research performed by Dr. David Jacobs, a professor at the U of MN School of Public Health. His findings indicate that nutrients given in isolation (like a vitamin C pill) act differently in the body than those same nutrients given in a whole food (like an orange). I thought his hypothesis was interesting, and very counter to the usual nutrition line of "Bodies need nutrients, not ingredients." I emailed him to see if he's be interested in speaking to vet students and he said that he'd love to come talk to us about how animal nutrition is handled. I want to set it up as a lunch meeting, but yikes, what pressure! How do you choose a lunch for a nutrition guru?

The vet school yoga class is going well. We just had our third session, and had a faculty member join us for the first time (yay). I'm enjoying it. It's so different from the rest of the school week- no one else is telling us to slow down, to listen to ourselves and to not do more than we can handle!

Outside of school, things are good. Winnie's ear is looking lots better. I just bought her a can of "Turducken" food for Thanksgiving, but I have a feeling she'll be sneaking some real turkey, too...

AHVMA debriefing

I promised to post about the AHVMA convention last week, but the pathology exam took over until yesterday... so here is my overdue conference blogging!

In one word, the conference was refreshing. We spend so much time in school right now focused on disease processes, bacterial infections, cancer, etc etc etc that it isn't hard to believe that bodies were meant to break down and vets are meant to put them back together. The holistic point of view focuses less on how to fix what breaks, and more on how to help the body fix itself. Obviously that doesn't mean that a holistic-minded vet won't put a broken leg in a cast, or won't prescribe antibiotics for a bacterial infection- but it does mean that he'll also examine the root of the problem, and try to find ways to support the body's intrinsic healing mechanisms.

It was also great to hear such a heavy emphasis placed on nutrition without a corporate name attached to it. Sure, we had our Intro to Nutrition course last year- but any lunchtime seminars outside of our classes are things along the lines of "How do I choose the right food for Fluffy? Sponsored by Purina!" I can't think of any student club that's sponsored a nutrition-related talk recently, probably because it feels like a topic that's covered so often during lunch seminars. Speakers at AHVMA mentioned nutrition in almost every lecture I attended, regardless of whether the topic was nutritionally-oriented or not. It was nice to hear some educated ideas about raw feeding from Dr. Nancy Scanlan, and while I'm still not in the BARF camp, I feel more open to considering raw feeding as appropriate for some dogs. Homemade diets do wonders for some pets, but both homemade and BARF require some big commitments (time-wise and energy-wise) that just aren't practical for most people. Kibble works great for a lot of pets, but remember the importance of feeding whole, real food sometimes too. Rabbit people are good at this, but a lot of dog and cat owners still hold on to the idea that "people food" is bad for their pets. Winnie loves carrots, cheese, berries, yogurt, potatoes, eggs, and pretty much anything that comes off of a breakfast, lunch, or dinner plate. Dogs in particular usually love variety, so mix in some goodies every now and then to keep that kibble interesting and healthy. Want to make your pet's food at home? Use a resource like a veterinary nutritionist or BalanceIt.com to make sure your pet gets all the nutrients s/he needs- because there was also no shortage of horror stories of homemade diets gone wrong at the convention.

Hearing about alternative therapies is always stimulating, whether it be on the "no way, that stuff is ridiculous" side or the "holy crap, you did what with acupuncture?!" side. On my list of things to explore further are acupuncture, chiropractic, and herbal medicine. On my list of "eh, I dunno yet" is homeopathy. Equine people seem to be ahead of the curve with chiropractic in particular, which makes sense- not many other species place such a high demand on their musculoskeletal systems, and while a dog's lameness might go basically unnoticed if it isn't too severe, a rider knows every little bit about his horse's gait and when things are just a little off. Dr. Susan Wynn was quite inspiring with her introductory talk about herbal medicine, but all of the Veterinary Botanical Medicine Association talks were way over my head. Basically, pharmacology is all about getting pure compounds with very specific effects on the body, but herbology is about determining how the huge number of compounds that exist in a particular plant can have therapeutic effects on the body as well. Plants are so incredibly chemically complex that, as Dr. Wynn said, the active ingredient is the plant itself. You can't pick one thing out that's therapeutic, because often the therapeutic effect is dependent on interactions between the compounds rather than the action of one chemical in particular. Alas, it is a field without a ton of research to support it right now, but the body of research is growing. Dr. Wynn's Veterinary Herbal Medicine is the best text available right now for vets, but there are a lot of books in the human medicine field as well.

One of the highlights of the meeting was actually a dinner held after the talks were over. One of the vitamin companies paid for dinner for all of the vet students and techs who were attending, and it ended up being a nice little group of four vet students and four techs. We talked for over two hours about everything from how the techs were utilizing alternative modalities like T-Touch to how students in our class viewed techs. We talked a lot about how techs and vets need mutual respect to function successfully together, and learned about what exactly techs are looking for from their vets and what they think their responsibilities are to their vets. It was very enlightening, and I learned more during that dinner than I have in a year of Professional Skills about how to keep a clinic running smoothly and happily. I also learned that I'll definitely hire a practice manager should I ever own my own clinic. Oh, happy National Vet Tech Week everyone!

I'm sure there's a lot more about the conference that I could say, but I think this post is long enough for now. It was a great experience, and was a little hard to come back to school after it was all done. Hopefully I'll be able to go again next year... Reno 2008, here I come!