Senators want coverage of alternative health

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Senators want coverage of alternative health

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twylahoodah

Tue Jul 28, 2009 7:27 pm (PDT)

WASHINGTON - Naturopathic doctors, herbal healers, mind-body

specialists, and acupuncturists often have been scorned by the US

medical establishment, but growing numbers of Americans are seeking such

care, and now an influential group of US senators believes the time has

come to embrace an array of alternative therapies.

Discuss

COMMENTS (47)

Senator Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat who is a longtime supporter of

nontraditional medicine, is at the forefront of the effort to win

insurance coverage for such providers as part of national healthcare

legislation.

 

“It’s time to end the discrimination against alternative

healthcare practices,’’ Harkin said at a congressional

hearing.

 

Harkin is the cosponsor of an amendment that says healthcare plans will

not be allowed to “discriminate’’ against any

healthcare provider who has a license issued by a state, an amendment

Senate aides said was designed to provide coverage for alternative

medicine.

 

 Backers of the amendment say it could save tens of billions of

dollars in the long run by providing less expensive and better

alternatives to drugs and surgery in a variety of cases. The amendment

was adopted by a Senate committee writing health legislation, but

details are still being negotiated.

 

With hundreds of disciplines falling under the general category of

alternative medicine, and with a variety of sometimes-conflicting

studies about their effectiveness, there is much disagreement about the

value of including such providers in a national health insurance

program.

 

State by state, there is a wide disparity of coverage of alternative

medicine. For example, Massachusetts licenses acupuncturists, and many

health insurance plans cover the service, but most do so only on a

limited basis, by restricting the number of visits or the dollar amount

of coverage.

 

Forty-four states license acupuncturists. Fifteen states, not including

Massachusetts, license naturopathic physicians, who use natural remedies

in their treatment.

Many practioners of alternative medicine say mainstream caregivers

don’t want the competition.

 

But the American Medical Association says there is little evidence to

confirm the safety or efficacy of most alternative practices.

“Much of the information currently known about these therapies

makes it clear that many have not been shown to be

efficacious,’’ the association said in a policy

statement. The association denies that it is trying to stifle

competition and says it is only trying to ensure that medicine is based

on science.

 

Dr. Harriet Hall, a retired Air Force flight surgeon who examines

medical claims for Skeptic magazine, said she worries that ill-informed

members of Congress will elevate practitioners of alternative medicine

to the same level as medical doctors.

 

“If it were shown to be truly effective, it would be part of

regular medicine,’’ she said.

Nonetheless, the federal government has become increasingly involved in

the field, funding the National Center for Complementary and Alternative

Medicine at the National Institutes of Health, and states are

increasingly being lobbied by providers to receive formal approval for

the field.

 

Massachusetts insurance companies recognize the growing consumer demand

for alternative therapies, said Dr. lou Buyse, president of the

Massachusetts Association of Health Plans, which represents groups

providing services to 2.4 million people. She said coverage varies from

one plan to another, but many plans provide for a limited number of

services such as chiropractic, acupuncture, and massage therapy. She

said costs would become prohibitive if Congress mandated that an

unlimited number of visits be covered.

 

Certain kinds of alternative medicine are considered mainstream in

sectors of the Massachusetts medical field, where they are increasingly

called “integrative’’ to emphasize that they are

done in concert with traditional medicine, not as an alternative. At the

Zakim Center for Integrative Therapies at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute,

traditional treatment is complemented by acupuncture and massage therapy

as well as counseling on mind-body techniques to reduce stress. For

example, acupuncture has proved beneficial to reduce nausea from

chemotherapy, according to the center’s co-clinical director,

Dr. Rosenthal.

 

“We have a tendency to treat drug symptoms with another drug. We

are looking at trying to find nonpharmalogical

approaches,’’ Rosenthal said.

 

The two main sponsors of the Senate amendment were Harkin and Senator

Barbara Mikulski, a land Democrat. Republicans, including the

ranking member on the Senate health committee, Senator Mike Enzi of

Wyoming, also backed the amendment. The Senate committee on Health,

Education, Labor and Pensions agreed to the measure, but it will be left

to the Senate Finance Committee, which is working on companion

legislation, to write crucial language regarding potential

reimbursement, Senate aides said. The matter will then be debated on the

Senate floor, and a similar amendment is expected to be offered in the

House.

 

Whatever the fate of the amendment, merely the fact that it is pushed by

a number of senators has been greeted as a breakthrough by supporters of

alternative medicine.

“I was shocked and elated that it was even on the

table,’’ said Shiva Barton of Winchester, one of 50

naturopathic doctors who practice in Massachusetts. Barton is leading an

effort to have Massachusetts grant licenses to naturopaths, which in

turn might enable them to be covered in the national plan.

 

Barton said that he mostly sees patients who have not been satisfied

with the results of traditional medicine.

 

“We are not opposed to conventional medicine, but it has its

limits,’’ Barton said. He talks with patients about

lifestyle changes, stress reduction techniques, vitamins, minerals,

herbal agents, acupuncture, and homeopathic remedies. He said that

naturopaths and other practitioners of alternative medicine are

discriminated against by a system that is dominated by well-financed

lobbies for medical doctors who don’t want competition.

 

Acupuncturists are also hoping for relief. Harvey Kaltsas, president

emeritus of the American Association of Acupuncture and Oriental

Medicine, said the country could save billions of dollars by shifting

care for a number of conditions away from pharmaceutical treatment and

toward acupuncture. Kaltsas said the number of licensed practitioners

has grown to 20,000 from just 300 in 1971, indicating that many people

are sold on the practice’s effectiveness.

 

Proponents of alternative medicine say they cannot match the lobbying

power of conventional-medicine groups, but they have been making

inroads. Dr. Mark Hyman, a physician based in Lenox who has authored

several books on what he calls “ultrawellness’’

said he has met with a number of senators, as well as administration

officials, about the need to provide for alternative therapies in the

healthcare legislation. He said he has received a sympathetic response

to his argument that the use of complementary therapies can save money.

 

Proponents of mind-body wellness and related stress-reduction techniques

also want to be included as care providers in the legislation.

 

Dr. Herbert Benson, the Boston-based author of the popular book The

Relaxation Response, said in an interview that Congress should revise

the healthcare legislation to incorporate his stress-reduction

techniques. Educating the public about the techniques, and hiring more

trainers to implement them, would save billions of dollars, said Benson,

director emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine

at Massachusetts General Hospital.

 

He emphasized that he supports using drugs and surgery when necessary,

but he said it is time to adopt national policies that focus on the need

for stress reduction.

Kranish can be reached at kranish@....

© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

 

 

 

 

 

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" Lose your mind so you can come to your senses.You cannot do all the

good the world needs,thus the world needs all the good you can

do. "

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SpiritcareAcupuncture.org