No matter what you call it,
integrative medicine growing quickly here

Published on Friday, June 27, 2008

Inside Tucson Business

Integrative medicine, alternative medicine, holistic medicine,
complementary medicine. It goes by many names, but one name that
always comes up when Tucson practitioners talk about it is Dr. Andrew
Weil, renowned author and integrative medicine pioneer.

Weil put Tucson on the integrative medicine map when he founded the
University of Arizona College of Medicine Program in Integrative
Medicine 14 years ago. Just recently that program was granted a
"Center of Excellence" designation by the university.

The honor recognizes the center as "a respected and significant voice
within the university, and indeed throughout the global healthcare
community," said Robert N. Shelton, UA president.

The center has received more than $7 million in federal funding and
has graduated nearly 300 integrative medicine fellows since its
founding.

The "Center of Excellence" designation will enable the center to court
top-level faculty and inspire a new era of program growth, including
an Integrative Medicine in Residency program. The center’s medicine
curriculum will soon be incorporated into standard three-year family
medicine residency programs throughout the nation.

Weil said the recognition was "among our greatest accomplishments to
date," adding, "The Center of Excellence designation formally
recognizes us as an innovator in educating the next generation of
physicians and healthcare professionals. Our challenge now is to
remain at the forefront of innovation so as to make integrative
medicine available to everyone, regardless of economic or geographic
limitation."

Three local integrative medicine businesses are putting new spins on
Weil’s concept that they hope will open the field to a broader group
of potential patients.

The first is a couple of medical doctors who are striving to expand
their reach to offer holistic treatment techniques that bring together
the mind, body and spirit (see story below).

The second business is a newly opened acupuncture clinic that works on
a sliding scale cost basis to make the procedure more affordable to a
larger number of patients (see story below).

The third business is about an expanding massage therapy clinic that
is part of a national chain offering affordable therapy through a
membership program (see story on Page 3).

Copyright © 2008 Inside Tucson Business

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