Madam, - Dr Liam Healy (June 23rd) makes the mistake of lumping all complementary therapies together. There is significant evidence, from both the lab and the clinic, for the effectiveness of herbal medicine.
There is always a need for more evidence and this is true for every branch of medicine. It was with this need for research in mind that the Irish Institute of Medical Herbalists developed (together with the Cork Institute of Technology) an honours BSc in Herbal Science with the aim of increasing research on the medicinal use of herbs.
This is a scientifically based, four-year, full-time course including subjects such as anatomy, physiology, nutrition, herbal pharmacy, pharmacology and pharmacognosy, together with analytical techniques. The IMH and CIT also co-hosted a conference on herbal research this year.
Sylvia Thompson is to be commended for realising that readers of The Irish Timesneed information on all areas of health and by doing so she is also respecting their ability to sift the wheat from the chaff.
Dr Healy does not live very far from CIT and a visit to the department of biological sciences will assure him that there is significant work going on to develop research in this area. - Yours, etc,
ROSARI KINGSTON,
Education Officer,
Irish Institute of Medical Herbalists,
Knockeens Church Cross,
Skibbereen,
Co Cork.
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Madam, - Dr Liam Healy's comments are tainted by generality and arrogance. It does not serve the cause of any type of medicine to say that therapists are peddling deception. True, deception can occasionally be found, but it is not limited to natural medicine practitioners.
Dr Healy's mistake is to treat the public as being ignorant and gullible. This is the age of information and public discernment, and increasingly people are questioning "the doctor", as well as therapists, and are not blindly accepting everything as was the norm in the past. Natural medicine therapists are now practising in their thousands, and are helping people with their problems. Those who are unskilled or unqualified will be rejected by a sophisticated and educated public, and in my experience of 20 years' practice it is mostly the educated who seek natural medicine.
Therapies with a pedigree of thousands of years are not fake. The same cannot be said about the fraud involved in some recent clinical trials of synthetic drugs. The term "doctor", of course, means teacher, and the physician originally was a teacher. But now the physician is tending to be more like a pupil - a pupil of the drug companies, which control nearly every aspect of medicine - research, education, marketing, promotion and the recent trend to define normal human conditions as a new disease.
The return of natural therapies is beneficial and timely, and it will expand in the years to come, as people realise that synthetic chemicals are not designed to cure disease, just block symptoms, and that they relentlessly cause more problems. They are a a major factor in the healthcare crisis. - Yours, etc,
ANTHONY HUGHES,
Leopardstown Drive,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.