Student Action in a New Integrative Medicine Model
Jon Mendelsohn from the Medical School for International Health, Israel, outlines a humanistic approach to medical education at his academic centre.
Is disease merely a physical problem, with ailing tissues and distorted biochemical pathways, or can other influences be involved in producing misalignment? Modern medicine is beginning to acknowledge that just a physical model of care does not completely provide restoration of health. Anecdotal reports have been replaced with evidence from scientific research; there is interplay between body, mind, and spirit that affects health.
At the Medical School for International Health (MSIH) in Be’er Sheva, Israel, some students are working in this new paradigm. Started with the backing of the school’s AMSA (American Medical Student Association) chapter in 2006, Students for Integrative Medicine is a group created to increase awareness of this approach to health. The group aims to:
…provide exposure and wellness activities…so that students may become more knowledgeable in the world’s diverse healing systems and philosophies of medicine.
The group has offered numerous activities to meet this goal. Students visited an integrative medicine clinic at a Jerusalem hospital to receive guidance in Acupuncture techniques and to discuss Homeopathy. Guest lecturers have spoken on Guided Imagery, Hypnosis, and the use of laugher and humor in healing. Meditation during lunch has offered students a chance to decompress and relax after morning classes. MSIH students are not alone in this interest. Thirty-five AMSA chapters across North America have started integrative medicine groups with similar projects.
This shifting paradigm in the understanding of health has revolutionized undergraduate medical training. AMSA has been a leader in this movement with its Humanistic Medicine action committee. They write, “…we advocate for patients and developing-physicians who consider healing to be a sacred, interpersonal experience between mindful and authentic human beings.” As a community of student activists, this forum offers integrative medicine education, mentorship contacts, project recommendations, and sponsors wellness retreats throughout the year. An exciting opportunity was given to the AMSA foundation when it was awarded a $1.2 million grant in 2002 from the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM). This body of the NIH offered AMSA the ability to fund a CAM curriculum at six MD/DO programs in the United States.
In another effort in medical education, The Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine advocates for an integrative model of mind, body and spirit care. The Consortium contains thirty-nine members, including Stanford, Yale, Johns Hopkins, Harvard, and Columbia. The mission of the Consortium is to:
…help transform medicine and healthcare through rigorous scientific studies, new models of clinical care, and innovative educational programs that integrate biomedicine, the complexity of human beings, the intrinsic nature of healing and the rich diversity of therapeutic systems.
This community of medical education institutions represents a developing leap in today’s approach to the philosophy of undergraduate medical education.
Once relegated to the fringe of medical practice, spirituality in medicine is becoming a part of conventional training. Perhaps representing the boldest initiative in addressing the spiritual needs of patients in medical education, the George Washington University Institute for Spirituality and Health’s curriculum offers an approach to this kind of care. For example, their FICA acronym is a tool used to take a “spiritual history” from a patient and asks about faith and belief, importance of these beliefs, membership in a spiritual or religious community, and assesses if the patient desire spiritual care from their health provider. Medical schools like Florida, Minnesota, UCLA, Vermont and Colorado have received grants from George Washington to begin offering this curriculum.
At the Medical School for International Health, students are working hard with the help of AMSA’s resources to raise awareness of integrative medicine. The administration’s central philosophy of teaching global medicine and cross-cultural care makes this a natural process. With the help of dedicated faculty members at MSIH and in many other schools and medical centers the divide between conventional thought and an integrative approach continues to shrink.
Jon Mendelsohn, MS III
Medical School for International Health
Ben Gurion University of the Negev
In collaboration with Columbia University Health Sciences
Be’er Sheva, Israel
jsmendelsohn@gmail.com
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