Towards a New Medicine
Comprehensively, based on a new view upon the human being, taking into account that we are more than a Cartesian chimera.
New?
We do not have to invent this ‘new view.’ It’s been lying around already for a long time. The issue is that it didn’t yet reach medical theory and practice as it should.
Actually, the view – as well as the opposite view, indeed – is as old as the streets of Jericho. What is new is the influx of science, especially during the last few decades, especially in the previous few years. As with many present-day evolutions, it goes in crescendo.
The deepest underlying reality of this all can be put as:
We are organic, not mechanic.
We are complicated, yes, but also complex.
However complicated a machine may be, it can be integrally controlled by an even more complicated machine.
Contrary to this, a complex being can only theoretically be controlled this way. In reality, such control is intractable. One can only control a complex being by putting it in a cage, mentally or physically. Trying to control it more risks damaging it.
In translation to medicine
The human being can be partly viewed mechanically and with efficient results. You break a leg; you let it be mended. You have a biochemical disease; it might be cured. A genetic, anatomic defect? Go see your surgeon. Many issues fall into this category.
Many don’t. Most importantly (to me), anything psyche-related doesn’t. Even the healing of your leg falls into this, partly. Many issues are a combination of underlying issues, wholly or partially unexplained. [see: “Medically Unexplained Syndromes“]
Writing this in 2020, COVID pops up, not being a viral disease, but a virus-body-mind condition. [see: “Minding COVID: a Different Story“] It should be looked upon as such if only because this is a prime example of so many more xx-body-mind diseases. For instance, in the coming pandemics.
Since a person is never sick without having his mind under the hood, we can generalize:
This is about the whole of medicine.
And more: about everything health-related. ‘Health’ can be seen very broadly, fully surpassing the borders of medicine. Surely, of present-day medicine.
That’s why we need a new kind of medicine, based on a correct view of the human being. We need it because:
It is more affordable.
From the mechanical viewpoint, we spend way, way, way too much money on diagnosis and therapy, trying to wring a cloud in a box.
That doesn’t work well. Moreover, one damages the cloud. Multiply this by millions. The financial cost is enormous. [see: “Saving € 1 trillion in healthcare… mindfully“]
It is more sustainable.
Very broadly. With no proper view of the human being, the healing cannot be causal in many cases. It’s cosmetic. Meanwhile, the cause either disappears by itself, shows again in the same way, or in another way. [see: “Sustainability From Inside Out“]
Diagnostic and therapeutic efforts in a flawed direction do not bring one closer to a profound solution. Humane resources are drained. Meanwhile, people can get even more dissociated from their inner complexity.
Awaiting more and more instances of nature’s revenge. This is the core of un-sustainability.
It is more respectful.
More respectful to ourselves.
The more open and truthful, the more one can be respectful to what one is open towards.
Scientifically, openness to the human being requires considering what is known about the human mind in totality. [see: “Subconceptual Processing in Health and Healing“]
It influences many domains apart from strictly health-care.
Nowadays, health gets a broad definition. I think the best point of departure in this is from a comprehensively pragmatic take on health. [see: “What is Health?“]
Logically, in-depth, there are less strictly delineated domains. Within medicine, for instance, we see that chronic pain syndromes tend to have underlying common causality. [see: “Chronic Functional Pain: All for One?“] Also between medicine and other domains, borders will fuzzify: education, religion, politics, the judicial, all kinds of leadership, etc.
Transcending many borders will be necessary in the future in order to keep the healing of individuals and communities – in the end, the whole of humanity – affordable, sustainable, and respectful.
As seen from the future, the change will be seen as a new kind of medicine.
Only truth can truly cure.
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