Whether you accept it, avoid it or live somewhere in between, insurance coverage has become a defining issue for our profession. Patients increasingly expect to use their benefits, practitioners want to be compensated fairly for their time and expertise, and the system itself remains – at best – fragmented. The encouraging news is that coverage has expanded in meaningful ways. The challenging news is that reimbursement, across the board, remains inadequate.
Chinese Medicine Is Here to Stay
I predict that Chinese medicine, more appropriately called Asian or Oriental medicine, given the contributions of the Japanese, Vietnamese, Koreans, etc., will become the prevailing paradigm for clinical medicine in this century. It includes and acknowledges the allopathic perspective on health and disease, but it has a broader scope and is more inclusive of the bioenergetic realities that can greatly contribute to the health of people on the planet. Moreover, its approach to understanding the raw materials of the earth, including plants and animals and its ability to assimilate these as therapeutic substances within the idiom of Chinese medical thinking, give the planet a vast and relatively inexpensive source of medicinals. It's a way of thinking whose time has come. Chinese medicine is here to stay.
Kokayi K. Chinese medicine is here to stay. Your Health Guide (www.yourhealthguide.tv), September 11, 2002.