Integrative health and medicine is an approach to care that combines conventional medical treatment with evidence-informed complementary practices, treating the whole person—body, mind, and lifestyle—rather than focusing on a single symptom or disease. It emphasizes the therapeutic relationship, patient-centered goa…
Integrative health and medicine is an approach to care that combines conventional medical treatment with evidence-informed complementary practices, treating the whole person—body, mind, and lifestyle—rather than focusing on a single symptom or disease. It emphasizes the therapeutic relationship, patient-centered goals, and the coordinated use of interventions such as nutrition, mind-body practices, manual therapies, and natural products alongside standard care. In the United States, the field is associated with the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), and the broader category of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) describes practices used together with, or in place of, conventional treatment. Proponents argue that integrative approaches can support prevention, chronic-disease self-management, symptom relief, and overall well-being, while the field also stresses the importance of safety, quality, and rigorous evaluation of complementary modalities. Because many CAM practices vary widely in their evidence base, careful scientific scrutiny is central to the discipline. Open-access research available here explores characterization and evaluation of an integrative or complementary health intervention within this framework.
1 peer-reviewed article, ranked by relevance. Each links to its DOI.