An overview of traditional, complementary and alternative medicine

Abstract

Hippocrates greatly contributed to modern medicine by declaring that medicine should stand on detailed observation, reason and experience in order to establish diagnosis, prognosis and treatment. After Hippocrates, medicine was no longer a mixture of superstition, magic, religion views and empirical treatment, exercised by priests-physicians, but became a real science with accumulating experience. From the early 19th century modern medicine continued on the path of evidence based medicine which means clinical experience supported by scientific researches and it reached significant improvement in the diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation process of diseases with the help of basic sciences such as biochemistry and pharmacology. However, in recent years, traditional-complementary-alternative medicine practices on which a consensus has still not been established for its naming has been applied by physchian/non-physician practitioners and is popular among the majority in all over the world. It’s important to know what these practices are and whether they are safe and effective, if it poses potential risks and threats on public health and interactions with other drugs. Scientific investigations regarding potential benefits should be supported and proven benefits need to be brought into modern medicine.