Health policy implications of the holistic health movement

A forthright rebellion against the philosophical and clinical orientations of scientific medicine has occurred in the United States during the 1970s. This rebellion includes a growing number of people engaged in self-care practices in attempts to alter their health status through "lifestyle" adjustments, as well as a diverse amalgamation of practitioners (both medical and otherwise), who offer a wide range of therapies outside the mainstream of modern medical practice. Holistic health care has lately become the rubric under which these therapies are grouped. Scientific medicine is the term commonly used to refer to procedures officially sanctioned by the organized medical profession. In the late 19th century, scientific medicine emerged as an advance beyond allopathic medicine after germ theory provided an explanation and, later treatment for infectious diseases. Financial support by private philantropic foundations came in the wake of the Flexner Report on medical education, which provoked a reorganization of medical education in the United States. The subsequent hegemony of scientific medicine thus became assured. To date, few policy analysts have attempted to assess holism and its health policy implications. This article delineates several of the more important policy issues raised by the holistic movement, a phenomenon that represents a challenge to the present organization of health care institutions as well as to scientific medicine.