BACKGROUND Although the Indian Health Service provides extensive health care service to Navajo people, the role of native healers, or medicine men, has not been quantitatively described. OBJECTIVE To determine the prevalence of native healer use, the reasons for use, cost of use, and the nature of any conflict with conventional medicine. METHODS We conducted a cross-sectional interview of 3...

This paper looks at challenges faced during the ongoing deployment of HEALER, a POMDP based software agent that recommends sequential intervention plans for use by homeless shelters, who organize these interventions to raise awareness about HIV among homeless youth. HEALER’s sequential plans (built using knowledge of social networks of homeless youth) choose intervention participants strategica...

Chumash Healers used breathing therapy and counseling to keep patients involved in daily life and to avoid depression. Heat therapy, massage and pain medications were used to help with pain. Another primary function of the Healer was to help the patient sleep as normally as possible, possibly using mugwort or momoy. Nutrition was considered by Healers in treating their patients. The overall con...

In Malawi, physicians analyzed retrospective data on 600 consecutive abortion cases who were admitted to the gynecology ward at Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe during January-May 1990. These cases comprised 45% of all admissions to this ward during the study period. 71% of the patients had first-trimester abortions and 29% had second-trimester abortions. 85% of cases were admitted with i...

An earlier paper in this journal reported on the perception and experience of 77 allopathic health practitioners (AHPs) and health managers about working together with South African traditional health practitioners (THPs). The paper stated that the abolishment of the Witchcraft Suppression Act of 1957 and the introduction of the Traditional Health Practitioners Act No. 22 of 2007 is a milestone...

Although initially dismissed as an "unlearned healer," D.D. Palmer has proven to be a literate if self-taught writer, editor, author and teacher, who utilized the medical literature of his day in a surprising manner in his many publications. An examination of his work in The Chiropractor's Adjustor demonstrated the exactness of his thought. Very few medical practitioners at his time in America ...