Holistic health, a term increasingly bandied about with reserve or reverence depending on one's perspective, is an uncharted or at least fuzzy area for many physicians. Its proponents, a curious axis of faith healers, chiropractors, clergymen, and PhDs, along with MDs, RNs, DOs, and others without visible signs of qualifications, preach a message as old as the Bible and as American as apple pie: personal growth through self-actualization and maximum functioning of mind, body, and spirit. Their methods of achieving such laudable goals run the full gamut from laying on of hands and kinesiology through internal purging or external application of castor oil, to meditation, unusual diets, and some of the most recent scientific developments, including biofeedback.
Holistic practitioners profess to treat the whole person, not simply disease. They claim traditional Western or scientific medicine is too disease oriented and splits mind from body. They not only integrate both but