(09/11/2006 Updated)

The word, Holistic, came from a Greek word (holos) meaning all, entire, total. Thus, holistic signifies "Whole."

While Western medicine capture, analyze, and treats any problem that occurs to your body (and mind) locally, Holistic approach deal with a problem as a whole body (and mind).

A problem with your body isn't illness?

Many people might have experienced to find out that there was no problem when visiting a doctor with feeling trouble. In Western medicine, it is not a problem if the trouble you have doesn't belong to the list of illness according to Western medicine. So is the problem an imagination?

You might have experienced some discomfort even though your pulse or blood pressure is normal and you don't have any fever. It is because you are comparing that condition with the condition when you feel good. You are the best person to know yourself. Numbers or appearance cannot tell everything.

In Holistic medicine, how/what you feel is the most important source to analyze the problem. When you feel discomfort, it is considered that your energy balance is off. It sometimes appears with your body condition. It sometime shows up psychologically. When the state continues, it becomes a sickness as in Western medicine.

Holistic medicine = Preventive medicine?

Is holistic medicine preventive medicine? The answer is no. Holistic medicine often catches before the condition becomes severe or sickness because it believes that preventive medicine is the basis of health.

However, the power of holistic medicine is not only its power of preventing problems. It often treats chronic illness like allergy, skin conditions, or severe illness that was given up by Western medicine.

There is a wonder drug for broken heart!?

Another wonderful aspect of Holistic medicine is that it gives great impact on psychological problems or feelings. Holistic approach genuinely believes that mind and body are deeply interrelated. Although you heal a problem with your body, it is not completed, if not worse, as long as you still have problems with your emotion/feelings.

In Holistic approach, it is an indication for problems if you are easy to get upset. Broken heart is like an accident within Holistic medicine. Holistic approach believes that there are solutions to any of the problems that are given up by Western medicine. Being healthy is consisted with a body without any problem and balanced mental state that brings happiness.

According to Japan Holistic Medical Society, being healthy means having well-balanced spirit and body, and conditions that can utmost quality of life by using the current state.

Partial vs. Whole

Whereas Western medicine focus on a part of body, Holistic medicine concentrates on balancing the whole body. If Western medicine treats a headache with headache specific, there is no specific medicine just to treat the headache in Holistic medicine. If Western medicine prescribes ointment to treat skin condition, there is no specific medicine just to treat the skin condition in Holistic medicine.

For example, if you are suffering from hives and you are given steroid, the condition might disappear after applying the steroid. Then, say if you experience a problem with your internal organ later on, Western medicine most likely diagnoses it as another problem and prescribe another type of medicine. However, Holistic medicine believes that these two conditions are the continuity of the problems. Or, the second problem (problem with your internal organ) is a result of the suppression of the first problem (hives). Our body cannot be taken partially. They all relate to one another.

When treating the problem of the internal organs of the patient with holistic approach, the hives which were treated may come back. If the problem with the internal organs was caused by the steroid which was prescribed for curing the hives, it should be proof to see the hives returned while curing the internal organ problem. The further the treatment for the internal organ goes, the better the conditions of the hives gets. This is also telling us that we cannot separate any problems that occur in our body.

Treatment by Natural Healing

In holistic medicine, what we use is the natural healing power that we human beings possess. Our body has wonderful healing power that cannot be explained by science. A cut will be closed by itself. Fever will go down eventually. However, we sometimes experience severe situations that cannot be cured by our natural healing power. Then, we have to provide our body some stimulation. Type of stimulation that is needed depends on each therapy. For example, homeopathy uses drinkable remedy. Acupressure uses pressure with fingers. The common perspective all those therapy share is that that stimulation isn't curing the problem. The stimulation is helping the natural healing power to cure the problem.

Treatment that Focuses on Energy

As we mentioned earlier, holistic medicine thinks that the problems occur when individual's energy become unbalanced. For example, Western medicine believes that virus caused infectious disease. However, holistic medicine believes that it was the unbalanced energy that caused virus to get into your system. Some people get sick and some don't even they stayed in a same room that was full of viruses. Vaccination to prevent viruses is not the fundamental solution. What you need to do is to try to balance your energy in order to block the viruses to get into your system.

Is holistic medicine mysterious medicine that cannot be explained with science?

We human beings have tendency to doubt anything that cannot be proved with some scientific verifications. However, it is mostly likely impossible to scientifically verified holistic medicine since it is dealing with energy which we cannot see. Currently, many of the interested parties including doctors from Western medicine are conducting numerous researches on holistic medicine to verify it with science. While we don't even know how exactly the Earth was born, isn't it strange not to believe what we cannot see? Whereas the information regarding Western medicine keeps contradicting one another, holistic medicine has been there for hundreds of years and hasn't changed much. Once you understand one concept, it connects you to the whole thing and gives you the ability to understand the whole thing. This should be the law of universe.