Seeing with two eyes: How professionals can help patients trying to integrate medical systems

Globally today, there is great awareness about complementary health systems[1] and the atmosphere regarding the integration of different medical systems is favorable. Several factors have emerged during the last 20 years that have led to the current situation: • Transition from an era dominated by communicable diseases to one dominated by systemic diseases and lifestyle disorders • Greater openness of all medical systems to spell out their limitations, particularly modern biomedical systems, from which powerful criticisms have emerged, yielding better understanding of its limitations • Greater political support for traditional medicine – recognition by international bodies like WHO of a potentially critical role for traditional medicine[1] in primary healthcare • Research on history, sociology, and epistemology of medicine leading to better understanding of how CAM systems like Ayurveda are knowledge systems in their own right