Many traditional Native medicines and healing practices were discouraged with the advent of Western medicine, but now there is a movement to return to traditional ways (Zubek, 1994, p. 1924). Modern Western medicine treats the symptoms to cure a diseased state when the body is out of homeostasis. Native American healing traditions do this as well with herbs and plants suited to the purpose. These Native healing traditions also include sacred rituals, chants, and purification rites to help bring the spirit and mind of the afflicted back into balance. In effect, treating the whole person, not only the disease. A blending of these two healing practices could bring about better prognoses for today's patients. The purpose of this paper is to show the views of practicing physicians and their patients in regards to Native American healing traditions. It also discusses a hot spring in Alaska, where participants go to experience holistic healing in the mineral springs and the success they have experienced using this form of healing process.
A study was performed in Canada by sending a 2-page questionnaire to 125 registered physicians. It's purpose was to show their knowledge of Native American healing traditions, and their willingness to cooperate with healers when treating their patients. A total of 79 (63.2%) of the questionnaires were returned (Zubek, 1994, p. 1925). The questions included whether the physicians approved of their patients seeking healers in different clinical settings (i.e. for health maintenance, benign and chronic illnesses, outpatient and inpatient settings, visits to intensive care units, and palliative care), for the prescribing of traditional medicine, who should be responsible for delivering traditiona...
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...are still many obstacles to be overcome, but this is an opportunity to help patients have a sense of whole body well-being through the use of alternative medicines such as Native American healing traditions, and hopefully more physicians and patients will be willing to consider it as an acceptable form of treatment for their medical needs.
Works Cited
Book, P. A., Dixon, M., & Kirchner, S. (1983). Native Healing in Alaska: Report From Serpentine Hot Springs. The Western Journal of Medicine,139, 923-927.
Marbella, A. M., Harris, M. C., Diehr, S., Ignace, G., & Ignace, G. (1998). Use of Native American Healers Among Native American Patients in an Urban Native American Health Center. Archives of Family Medicine,7, 182-185.
Zubek, E. M. (1994). Traditional Native Healing: Alternate or adjunct to modern medicine? Canadian Family Physician, 40, 1923-1931.
In the article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema” By Horace Miner, there are a few points that he is trying to put across. Firstly, it is sometimes difficult to collect accurate information about a culture when you do not belong to it. Not everything will be explained in great detail, which forces a person to make assumptions about what they are being shown or what they are hearing. Secondly, Americans seem to always believe everything that they are told from doctors because they have been highly respected for many generations and people learn from when they are very young that when they are sick, they must go see the doctor to feel well again. Lastly, People always believe that they cannot heal without medicine because doctors have been making people believe that medicine is the key to healing for many years.
pp. 41-84. Pine Forge Press, Thousand Oaks, Calif. Pigg, Stacy Leigh. (1997) "Found in Most Traditional Societies: Traditional Medical Practitioners between Culture and Development.”
From a western perspective, children and the elderly are the most vulnerable population and need to be given extra attention and precautions. I shadowed a pharmacist working at a children’s hospital and observed the level of care given to the patients. Fadiman evidently wants the reader to understand how cultural differences can become a barrier in providing medical care. Bruce Thowpaou Bliatout, a Hmong medical administrator, provides some measures to improve Hmong healthcare, including minimizing blood drawing, allowing shamanic ceremonies in the hospital, involving family and encouraging traditional arts.
A spiritual ritual would be performed while the ill received medicine. A spiritual ritual would be performed to rid the ill of bad spirits and cleanse the spirit. Native Americans believed that a person became ill when a bad spirit entered the body. It is the shaman’s job to try to purify the ill’s spirit. Every tribe across the nation has a shaman. A shaman or medicine man/woman would perform this ritual. A shaman uses the spiritual world to help heal the sick. Shaman were highly regarded as chiefs and tribal spiritual leaders. Shaman were often born into a family with many generations of shaman. Shamans who were not born into, they had visons that lead them to study medicine. Being the shaman was a full-time job. In return of their services to the tribe, the tribe would provide food, shelter, and any assistance needed to the shaman.
attention to those cases in which the individuals were cured. A Cree tale that involved a woman
Through showing the different definitions of health, the authors explain how those different understandings affect patterns of behavior on health depend on different cultures. In addition, an analysis of the models of health demonstrates even western medical approaches to health have different cognitions, same as the Indigenous health beliefs. The most remarkable aspect is a balance, a corresponding core element in most cultures which is an important consideration in Indigenous health as well. From an Indigenous perspective, health is considered as being linked, and keeping the connection is a priority to preserve their health. Consequently, health is a very much culturally determined. Health practitioners should anticipate and respect the cultural differences when they encounter a patient from various cultures. In particular, this article is good to understand why the Indigenous health beliefs are not that different than western medicine views using appropriate examples and comparative composition, even though the implementation the authors indicated is a bit abstract, not
Throughout this semester, I gained knowledge about the Hmong culture and how their shamanistic beliefs clash with the American way of life. It continues to be a struggle in today’s society for the Hmong people since culture barriers as well as the lack of communication occurs between the Hmongs and Americans. Based on the novel, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, by Anne Fadiman, Fadiman explains how Lia’s parents find Western medicine practices rather foreign. An example of this can be seen on page 19 in chapter 5.
For many centuries, humanity has been on an eternal quest for cures and treatments for many chronic conditions. At the present time, conventional medicine is mostly performed by doctors and other health care professionals, with the extensive use of pharmaceutical drugs, surgery or radiation treatments for disease treatment. Conversely, even though not as popular, complementary and alternative medicine and treatment options are slowly gaining popularity and becoming an addition to traditional medicine.
In the US., the therapeutic group seldom has approaches to correspond with individuals of societies so drastically unique in relation to standard American society; even a great interpreter will think that it troublesome deciphering ideas between the two separate societies' reality ideas. American specialists, not at all like Hmong shamans, regularly physically touch and cut into the collections of their patients and utilize an assortment of capable medications and meds.
Ross defines and differentiates between the terms healing and curing. She recognizes the fact that healing and curing are very intertwined and it can be hard to distinguish between the two terms. There are differences between the definitions in scholarly and general settings. She references an ethnographic study of healing versus curing conducted by anthropologists Andrew Strathern and Pamela Stewart in 1999 with native groups in New Guinea. The results of the study looked at how energy used by the different types of tribal healers to either cure or heal a patient. Eastern medicine focuses on how energy interacts with the healing process in connection within the mind. Whereas Western medicine is focused on the mind and the body separately. The practice is considered a holistic approach to finding cures. According to Ross (2013), healing is more a therapeutic process targeting the whole body and specific illness including emotional, mental, and social aspects in the treatment. The act of curing is a pragmatic approach that focuses on removing the problem all together. The life experiences of a person playing into how well certain treatments will heal or cure what is ailing them. These aspects can not be defined with textbook definitions. The interaction that the healing process has with energy is a variable in the success rate. Uncontrolled emotions can have a greater impact on the inside the body than a person can realize. The exploration of energy interaction within the body can be used for greater analysis of health care systems. (21-22). Are Western healthcare facilities purposely “curing” patients just so that they return are few years later? Is Western Medicine built upon a negative feedback loop? The terminolo...
Holistic Medicine, commonly referred to as “Alternative Medicine”, is a vast and rapidly growing new scientific field. It is derived mainly from ancient, traditional methods of healing that have often been practiced in the East for centuries. These include a variety of techniques from herbal healing to acupuncture to homeopathy to energy channeling. Due to the large number of methods that are covered by the term, there are various definitions of Holistic Medicine. However, all literature seems to agree that Alternative Medicine, is exactly what the name suggests: an ‘alternative’ approach to healing and medicine. It is a more personal move toward health care, which attempts to connect the mind, body and spirit.
Aboriginal health is majorly determined by several social factors that are related to their cultural beliefs. Health professionals regularly find it difficult to provide health care to aboriginal people due to the cultural disparity that exists between the conventional and aboriginal cultures, predominantly with regard to systems of health belief (Carson, Dunbar, & Chenhall, 2007). The discrepancy between the aboriginal culture and typical Western customs seems to amplify the difficulties experienced in every cross-cultural setting of health service delivery (Selin & Shapiro, 2003). Most of the social determinants of the aboriginal health are due to their strict belief in superstition and divine intervention.
Kleinman, A. 1980. Patients and Healers in the Context of Culture: An Exploration of the Borderland between Anthropology, Medicine, and Psychiatry. University of California Press.
Native Americans have specific culture characteristics health care providers should have basic knowledge of to provide optimal health care. They received the title “Native” because they are indigenous to North Ame...
Certain religious groups reject westernized medicine, like the Amish. Yet, for the most part most religions allow their medicinal practices to work in tandem with westernized medicine. For example, First Nations people tend to have a very holistic view when it comes to their surroundings and medicine. Aboriginal traditional approaches to health and wellness include the use of sacred herbs like sage or tobacco and traditional healers/medicine (pg. 5, Singh, 2009). However, they will not reject help from professionally trained doctors and medical staff. Much like other religions, First Nations put a strong emphasis on family/community. Consensus or decision-making is fairly common for them. A practitioner or medical staff member must remember to respect ceremonial objects such as tobacco or traditional blankets, include immediate family members when making a treatment decision, and to accommodate spiritual practices. Normally, organ donation is accepted UNLESS the organ is being removed from someone who is not deceased. First Nations’ believe that their bo...