In recent years, complementary and alternative medicine (“CAM”) has grown in both popularity and economic import across all segments of society and is now an established presence in the lives of millions of Americans. It has generated its own field of adherents, practitioners, opponents, lobbyists and counter-lobbyists, case law, and regulations. On one side of the CAM equation stand the advocates of CAM: its practitioners and satisfied patients. On the other stand its detractors: its dissatisfied patients, groups within the established or mainstream medical community, and historically, the American Medical Association (“AMA”). In the aggregate, the two sides engage in large scale scientific and philosophical battles over how best to treat or address the health care needs of patients. On a smaller scale, individuals on each side are essentially lobbying to protect their professions and their jobs. The struggle between the two warring camps fills volumes of medical, legal and popular scholarship. However, it is not the point of this Note to address the validity of the debate between CAM and mainstream medicine.
What’s attitude should we hold?: The balance between CAM (complementary and alternative medicine) and mainstream medicine.
