title: What does «integrative medicine» provide to daily scientific clinical care?
abstract: Integrative medicine is an ambitious and noble-minded attempt to address the shortcomings of the current public health systems in our Western societies, which is restricted by the limited time available, especially in outpatient clinics. Integrative medicine also does not limit the possibilities of useful therapies that have been tested over the centuries (from China, India, etc.) or of certain resources that do not achieve the level of desired scientific credibility but that present certain therapeutic support in specific cases (homeopathy, acupuncture, etc.) but still require a scientific approach. Finally, the resource of botanical products (phytotherapy) constitutes a wide range of possibilities that universities can (and do) make progress on by providing drug brands for these products through the use of the scientific method and evidence-based medical criteria. This approach will help avoid the irrationality of the daily struggle between conventional scientific medicine (which we apply to the immense majority of patients) and the other diagnostic-therapeutic «guidelines» (natural medicine, alternative medicine, complementary medicine, patient-focused medicine and others).
authors.affiliation: Cátedra de Eméritos de la Comunidad Valenciana, Valencia, España. Electronic address: Ramon.Bataller@uv.es.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bataller-Sifre
authors.affiliation: Centro de Atención Primaria, Área de Pediatría, Carretera Artes, Valencia, España.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bataller-Alberola
keywords: Alternative medicine; Complementary medicine; Fitoterapia; Integración en medicina; Integrated medicine; Integration in medicine; Medicina alternativa; Medicina complementaria; Medicina integrativa; Phytotherapy