Mayo Clinic Goes Alternative

Have you gone to your local bookstore lately? One of the most fascinating finds is a magazine/journal called Mayo Clinic Guide to Alternative Medicine. It is a novel and curious way how "mainstream" medicine is finding itself more into a world of health that was considered suspect at best just 10 years ago. But, nowadays, prestigous institutes such as Mayo Clinic and even the National Institutes of Health have divisions that are studying herbals, vitamins, antioxidants, enzymes and minerals. This is a major milestone. But, don't get too overly excited as one "outdated" school of thought tries to "adopt" another much older one. It may prove tricky to the consumer to see just how altruistic this move may be as major drug companies are seeing the real financial benefit also of not only making medications , but supplements as well.But, there are some interesting things I see that Mayo's is doing and we should recognize what some of their findings are concluding because they do appear to validate what herbalist, herbalogist, botanist, Alternative, Naturopathic, and Homeopathic practitioners have been stating:

1) Massage therapy can reduce post operative pain.
2)Ambience therapy with natural sounds of nature seems to effect the speed of recovery after surgery.
3)Paced breathing which is a form of regulated breathing often seen by gurus seems to help reduce stress, anxiety and even hot flashes. Mayo Clinic offers it as an alternative to breast cancer survivors who can not take estrogen treatment.
4)Ginseng is showing positive research data that it can reduce cancer related fatigue
5)Ginko relieves "chemo brain" a phenomenom associated with cognitive slowing due to chemotherapy from the oxidative stress it has on cells
6)Mangosteen acts as an anti-inflammatory agent in cardio-vascular procedures such as post electro-cardioverstion of atrial fibrillation.

These are things typically supported in the world of "Alternative" Medicine and have been known for years, but now seems to have Mayo's and the Office of Cancer Complementary and Alternative Medicine(OCCAM) at the NIH look into these effects is evolutionary. Are we witnessing a slow progressive shift in the paradigm of medicine. I think so. These are amazing times where on one end of the spectrum genetric therapy biomedical tech is proceeding rapidly ahead , but we always seem to find ourselves "coming back home to nature" .