Where are all of the holistic nurses?

[PaleoNurse]

I would love for this holistic nursing forum to be more active! I am been so immersed in the holistic/integrative world for the last few years that it is odd to me when I read a lot of the posts in the general nursing forum. It reminds me of how grateful I am to have discovered alternative health.

If you are a holistic nurse, what brought you to the field? What does your current practice look like?

I became involved in holistic nursing and functional medicine almost 3 years ago. I was diagnosed with 3 autoimmune diseases and I was really struggling and very ill for a while. Then I discovered food as medicine and the transformation in my health was remarkable. I went back to school for additional certifications in holistic nutrition and herbalism and now I have a practice nutritional therapy and functional medicine practice.

I'd love to connect with other like-minded nurses!

[cayenne06, MSN, CNM]

Steelworks, what is the science behind homeopathy? What is the science behind the subluxation theory of chiropractic? How about the science behind "vitalism"?

Exercise, nutrition (both good nutrition in general and targeted nutrition therapy), lifestyle modifications and addressing the psychosocial/spititual needs of patients are not "CAM."

Do you think it is ethical for naturopaths and chiropractors to recommend supplements to their patients that they personally sell and profit from? Do you think it is ethical for "alternative health" providers to charge money for treatments that have been shown ineffective or potentially harmful? Do you think it's ethical to prey on vulnerable sick people by subjecting them to unproven treatments, taking thousands and thousands of their dollars, giving them false hope and steering them away from appropriate medical care, even if that care might only be palliative?

Sure, some of what CAM recommends is evidence based. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. The difference is that science based medicine is based on the scientific method- systematically evaluating evidence and constantly striving for better outcomes. It's not a perfect system, and change can be painfully slow. But it's then best system we have. Alternative "medicine" seems to base it's treatments/recommendation on a certain philosophy of care (vitalism, namely- whether it is labeled as such or not), not on a systematic evaluation of outcomes.

Any effective "CAM" is readily adopted by science based medicine. Your example about blood transfusions shows how science is a self correcting system, albeit painfully slow at times.

[cayenne06, MSN, CNM]

No question, the MLM stuff works. If you can afford $600 a month, it will even reverse your leukemia or possibly end your AIDS as it did for 10 of 16 pediatric AID's patients in McGill Hospital according to one study over 10-15 years. What we are missing about this, they have an incredible marketing machine, solidarity, a culture and a network which is why they succeed and many holistic nurses are struggling.

.

This right here? Exactly why CAM is dangerous. Would love to see this study.

[Steeleworks]

I am so sorry. I thought this post was to encourage a discussion on the challenges of holistic healthcare and how it can be introduced to more people. I did not know that it was about challenging whether alternatives work or not.

Please note I am not anti hospital or anti doctor. I still work with main stream doctors and nurses. Some of them are coming on board with holistic treatments. Some have even adopted increasing salt intake and drinking water (the Water Cures Protocol) and are finding incredible results.

As to the negative comments, well, we could go back and forth on this all day. There are greedy people in both in the pharmaceutical industry and in vitamins and supplement industries.

Lets agree that we disagree on the making profits helping people. You need look no farther than pharmaceutical study bias and fraud, medicare fraud, chemotherapy fraud and more to see that medicine is more than a flawed system. There was a time I made more as a hospital nurse than hospitalists (after they paid dues and medmal). I don't understand...it is OK to make a living as a nurse and now, as a holistic nurse it is not OK. Is it OK to make a living as a MD but not as a ND? As a holistic nurse, I am making far less but helping thousands more annually.

In the US, we have the #1 health care system in the world...when it comes to being most expensive. We are over the 70 percentile when it comes to how bad...yep, we are way beyond flawed.

But...to be sure...here is some of the research on the natural treatment that was found to be more effective than chemo....and improve the quality of life.

BTW...did you ask about false hope? Prey on vulnerable sick people by subjecting them to unproven treatments, taking thousands and thousands of their dollars, giving them false hope...?

Did you think about the following in your summation?

This first one is over 20 years old and is still not used in main stream health care....Why....oh, wait, there are not billions to be made?

Five-year survival rates of melanoma patients treated by diet therapy after the manner of Gerson: a retrospective review.

Five-year survival rates of melanoma patients treated by diet therapy after the manner of Gerson: a retrospective review. - PubMed - NCBI

And what about this....

Study Accidentally Finds Chemotherapy Makes Cancer Far Worse | Natural Society

Reporting their findings in the journal Nature Medicine, scientists reported their findings were ‘completely unexpected'. Evidence of significant DNA damage due to chemo. In other words, it does not work.

But wait. Don't some people get better? How do we know that they did not get better in-spite of the chemo.

There are more...a lot more.

http://www.cell.com/cancer-cell/abstract/S1535-6108%2811%2900447-8

Whatever manipulations we're doing to tumors can inadvertently do something to increase the tumor numbers to become more metastatic, which is what kills patients at the end of the day,” said study author Dr. Raghu Kalluri.

We can go all day on the merits. Lets agree that we disagree.

I know alternatives work. We can both find papers that say what we both promote does not work and that it does work.

Look at any of the rescued from the grave testimonials on my site and you will find dozens of people who will tell you alternatives work.

The question, what are you doing to make the system better.....challenging holistic? Sorry, but we have too much evidence that is not bought and paid for proving what we do works. The world is shifting its desire toward holistic. Now, the question for everyone else, how can we make it better. How can we make it main stream. How can we improve the health of even more people?

[ixchel]

Blood saves lives. Well, "Not according to the science," says Dr. Richard Spence, an expert on bloodless medicine and surgery. "All the high level studies show that any to the more blood you get, the greater the morbidity and mortality," he said, not to mention immunomodulation (decreased immunity) for life.

Holy confounding variables, Batman.

CLEARLY the problem is the blood transfusions. It obviously has NOTHING to do with the fact that the people are BLEEDING OUT.

[ixchel]

Exercise, nutrition (both good nutrition in general and targeted nutrition therapy), lifestyle modifications and addressing the psychosocial/spititual needs of patients are not "CAM."

Hey, look!!!!! That's what holistic ACTUALLY means!

[Steeleworks]

Dear Paleo,

You said, "I'd love to connect with other like-minded nurses!" Unfortunately, as you can see, this kind of forum brings out people who have nothing meaningful to contribute, do not offer sound and well thought out arguments (if they are against it) and have to resort to bullying and snarky comments.

With all due respect, I have been given way more intelligent arguments against my practice by doctors. The flaming mostly comes from other nurses. Sad, but this is the world we live in. Why would someone want to come on here and tell the wonders that they are enjoying to be treated this way? Interestingly, when nothing else works, these same doctors send the people they cannot help to me.

Here is something I found on peer reviewed journal....it has been massged to be more focused on holistic health care but I believe it to be true about the resistance to change.

"Despite extensive clinical evidence to support the accuracy and conformity of many holistic treatments, many in the medical community are unwilling to accept these treatments as effective, efficient and safe."

"Throughout the history of medicine, iconoclastic thought processes and new evidence suggesting novel treatments of disease mechanisms, such as the holistic treatment of health conditions clash as they are met with controversy, resistance, and sluggish knowledge translation."

I do believe, we have a marketing problem, not a modality problem. People would not keep coming to us if we were not helping them. People are stopping seeing the medical profession because of the outcomes. While we will always go to doctors with broken bones, cuts and burns, there are some things that can be treated better without chemicals and invasive procedures.

Because of the readmission rules, there is now a huge opportunity to take holistic into the mainstream of hospital care. I started out practicing holistic in the hospital. I have seen vary few nurses actually practice holistic nursing. They are there but they are few.

How can I say this? Consider just the Blood Transfusion Issue...the common disdain from almost all nurses would be, "I don't believe in it." Wait, bloodless medicine is not a religion, it is a modality that met the needs of my patients, mind, body and spirit. In the thousands I case managed, none died. None of my patients or clients got AIDS as did over 50,000 in Canada. None of my clients got Hep C (oops, we got the test wrong but it is fixed now).

As to the "do you know what holistic means? comment, once an aid called a code on a patient with lung strictures due to drug use. The aid thought that she was going into respiratory arrest. I got to her first, put my arm around her and held her. In 15 seconds I had her breathing and avoided intubation. The team was not happy. The aid made a good call but wrong. My patient was treated in an alternative way that saved her any additional pain and suffering. One hug that day actually kept the doctor away.

This list of why most are not holistic could go on. We have a long way to go.

[dinah77, ADN]

Dear Paleo,

You said, "I'd love to connect with other like-minded nurses!" Unfortunately, as you can see, this kind of forum brings out people who have nothing meaningful to contribute, do not offer sound and well thought out arguments (if they are against it) and have to resort to bullying and snarky comments.

With all due respect, I have been given way more intelligent arguments against my practice by doctors. The flaming mostly comes from other nurses. Sad, but this is the world we live in. Why would someone want to come on here and tell the wonders that they are enjoying to be treated this way? Interestingly, when nothing else works, these same doctors send the people they cannot help to me.

Here is something I found on peer reviewed journal....it has been massged to be more focused on holistic health care but I believe it to be true about the resistance to change.

"Despite extensive clinical evidence to support the accuracy and conformity of many holistic treatments, many in the medical community are unwilling to accept these treatments as effective, efficient and safe."

"Throughout the history of medicine, iconoclastic thought processes and new evidence suggesting novel treatments of disease mechanisms, such as the holistic treatment of health conditions clash as they are met with controversy, resistance, and sluggish knowledge translation."

I do believe, we have a marketing problem, not a modality problem. People would not keep coming to us if we were not helping them. People are stopping seeing the medical profession because of the outcomes. While we will always go to doctors with broken bones, cuts and burns, there are some things that can be treated better without chemicals and invasive procedures.

Because of the readmission rules, there is now a huge opportunity to take holistic into the mainstream of hospital care. I started out practicing holistic in the hospital. I have seen vary few nurses actually practice holistic nursing. They are there but they are few.

How can I say this? Consider just the Blood Transfusion Issue...the common disdain from almost all nurses would be, "I don't believe in it." Wait, bloodless medicine is not a religion, it is a modality that met the needs of my patients, mind, body and spirit. In the thousands I case managed, none died. None of my patients or clients got AIDS as did over 50,000 in Canada. None of my clients got Hep C (oops, we got the test wrong but it is fixed now).

As to the "do you know what holistic means? comment, once an aid called a code on a patient with lung strictures due to drug use. The aid thought that she was going into respiratory arrest. I got to her first, put my arm around her and held her. In 15 seconds I had her breathing and avoided intubation. The team was not happy. The aid made a good call but wrong. My patient was treated in an alternative way that saved her any additional pain and suffering. One hug that day actually kept the doctor away.

This list of why most are not holistic could go on. We have a long way to go.

Oh my. Do you listen to yourself before you speak????

At the end did you really call an aid (sic)wrong for calling a rapid reponse on someone who was in respiratory distress?

Your dismissal of science is troubling at best and dangerous at worst.I find this quote best sums up the problem with this[h=1]What do you think science is? There's nothing magical about science. It is simply a systematic way for carefully and thoroughly observing nature and using consistent logic to evaluate results. Which part of that exactly do you disagree with? Do you disagree with being thorough? Using careful observation? Being systematic? Or using consistent logic?”[/h]

― Steven Novella

"

[ixchel]

Oh my. Do you listen to yourself before you speak????

At the end did you really call an aid (sic)wrong for calling a rapid reponse on someone who was in respiratory distress?

Your dismissal of science is troubling at best and dangerous at worst.I find this quote best sums up the problem with this[h=1]What do you think science is? There's nothing magical about science. It is simply a systematic way for carefully and thoroughly observing nature and using consistent logic to evaluate results. Which part of that exactly do you disagree with? Do you disagree with being thorough? Using careful observation? Being systematic? Or using consistent logic?”[/h]

― Steven Novella

"

Pffffft whatevs. Eff science. It is nothing more than a judgmental ploy to hide the truth. Besides, I hated science before it was cool.

[Steeleworks]

Perhaps I did not word it well. I said, "The aid thought that she was going into respiratory arrest."

Lets see...patient is having an anxiety attack. Looks to the aid like the patient is in respiratory arrest but it was an anxiety attack. Yep. The aid called a code blue on an anxiety attack. I did not know it was an anxiety attack until I came into the room and looked at her. As soon as I saw the patients face, it was apparent that it was not respiratory arrest.

How did I know this. The science called 'body language' (which is a systematic way for carefully and thoroughly observing nature and using consistent logic to evaluate results) and, I don't know, maybe a my vent trach experience.

The treatment that brought the patient out of the anxiety attack, a hug...(treating the whole person thing we have been talking about here). You tell me...was she wrong calling a code. She made the right call based on her limited knowledge but she was still wrong.

When you say things like, "Do you listen to yourself before you speak????," it just feels like it is an attack on me.

First, if I offended you in any way personally, I would like to apologize. But attacking what I say, help me understand how this contributes to the discussion? How does this show that holistic is either good or bad? Is this about me or the modality and the treatments that are given?

We need to stop attacking fellow nurses and we need to start looking at how we can make health care better. Nitpicking words, that is not helping. It only detracts.

And, by the way, to answer one of your questions, well, I am writing. Did I read what I wrote before I hit post...yes.

Again, why would anyone want to post to this thread if they are going to be bullied for what they say?

To answer the question at the start, Where are the Holistic Nurses....yes where are they? Why would they want to post here?

Oh wait, I know....."Throughout the history of medicine, iconoclastic thought processes and new evidence suggesting novel treatments of disease mechanisms, such as the holistic treatment of health conditions clash as they are met with controversy, resistance, and sluggish knowledge translation."

[ixchel]

Steele, anxiety is often a symptom of something else when inpatient. Pulmonary edema, MI, tamponade, just to name a few. Established trachs may have "that look" about them when clearing secretions, but non trach patients usually do not.

[dinah77, ADN]

Also a symptom of pulmonary embolism

[Steeleworks]

Ixchel,

Thank you for that. I have been out of high tech peds as well as vent trach nursing in the ICU for over a decade now. I started on a Seamons (I think that was the name) and ended with the Gerber (the one the size of a telephone book). It has come a long way since I started in it and since I left that field.