Message from The Executive Director

By Adam Perlman, MD, MPH, FACP

Our Institute was named the Institute for Complementary and Alternative Medicine or ICAM largely because Complementary and Alternative Medicine or CAM is the term that the National Institutes of Health uses to describe this group of diverse health care practices and disciplines not currently considered to be part of main stream medicine. Therefore, the Institute's name reflects its academic core and principle mission to increase the knowledge base on CAM for practitioners and the public.

However, in addition to conducting CAM research, providing CAM educational programs and developing clinical programs that increase access to CAM related services, our Institute and those individuals that are a part of it, are interested in a reshaping of healthcare in this country. To do that, we have taken an active leadership role in furthering the concepts of Integrative Medicine.

Integrative Medicine has been defined by the Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative (CAHCIM) as the practice of medicine that reaffirms the importance of the relationship between practitioner and patient, focuses on the whole person, is informed by evidence, and makes use of all appropriate therapeutic approaches, healthcare professionals and disciplines to achieve optimal health and healing.

CAHCIM's current membership includes 41 leading academic medical centers. CAHCIM's mission, as displayed on its website (www.imconsort.org), is to help transform medicine and healthcare through rigorous scientific studies, new models of clinical care, and innovative educational programs that integrate biomedicine, the complexity of human beings, the intrinsic nature of healing and the rich diversity of therapeutic systems.

I am currently vice chair and chair elect of that organization. Susan Gould-Fogerite, ICAM's Director of Research is chair of the research working group. Karen Malone, ICAM's new Director of Education is actively involved on the education working group and Beatrix Hamm, MD from Robert Wood Johnson Medical School is a member of the clinical working group.

For those of us at ICAM and others within the Consortium, it was very welcomed news to hear that the Institute of Medicine (IOM) is convening a summit in Washington, D.C. , on February 25-27, 2009 to explore the science and practice of Integrative Medicine. The summit is the result of a partnership between IOM and The Bravewell Collaborative, a foundation comprised of philanthropist committed to transforming the culture and delivery of healthcare. As noted in the press release from the National Academies, “the summit will examine ways integrative medicine seeks to address the personal and community environments that shape and empower patients' knowledge, skills, and support to be active participants in their own care”. Click here for more information on the summit.

This summit represents an important step toward understanding the challenges that our healthcare system faces and the potential for the concepts of integrative medicine to address some of those challenges. It will hopefully be an important step forward for clinicians, researchers and the public toward understanding that ultimately interest in CAM and the interest of those of us at ICAM is not so much about a desire to provide the evidence that will convince patients or practitioners to substitute Saint John's Wort for Prozac or take Glucosamine for arthritis, but more of a desire for an improved healthcare system. It is a desire for a healthcare system that is patient-centered, supported by science, yet open-minded and considers the whole person, including issues of body, mind and spirit.

This goal overlaps with the goal and desire of many organizations and individuals. At ICAM, we are always eager and appreciative of the opportunity to collaborate with colleagues. I would again like to thank everyone who has supported our Institute through ideas, collaboration and friendship and invite any one with interest to contact us.

However, I would like to express a special thank you and note of gratitude to Dave Gibson, Dean of the School of Health Related Professions within which ICAM is housed. Without Dean Gibson's vision and overwhelming support, ICAM would not have been founded and could not have flourished. Dean Gibson will be retiring this year, but his legacy will live on at ICAM and SHRP. It will live on through every student taught in our Integrative Health and Wellness track within the Masters of Science in Health Science program, through every research manuscript published and every community member or employee taking part in one of our yoga or other clinical programs. We will miss Dean Gibson, but we will not forget all that he has done to strengthen ICAM, SHRP, UMDNJ and ultimately our health care system.

Sincerely,

Adam Perlman MD, MPH, FACP

UMDNJ Hunterdon Endowed Professor of Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Executive Director, Institute for Complementary and Alternative Medicine