The Extractive Nature of Integrative Medicine

Integrative medicine is a reasonable theoretical model but becomes dysfunctional when put into practice. This article explains the problems and nature of integrative medicine, with a particular focus on its relationship to traditional Chinese medicine. Ma Huang (Ephedrae Herba) and ‘dry needling’ are explored as two simple examples of the risks of removing something from the Chinese medical paradigm and placing them into another paradigm devoid of context. A large integrative clinic is examined to determine the detrimental effects of the application of the full integrative model. Finally, a simple three-tiered model is proposed as an alternative to the integrative model.