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Within the
provision of health care throughout the world
today there are vastly differing paradigms at
work, although here in Australia it would be
fair to say that the prevailing form of health
care is based on the western biomedical model.
Questions need to be asked as to whether this
model of health care is the most appropriate
approach to health and healing in Australia and
indeed throughout the world for the 1990's. To
understand the answers to these questions we
need to explore the philosophical basis of some
of these prevailing paradigms. What is their
approach health and healing? Does the approach
focussing on a wellness model or on an illness
model? Does it approach health in isolation from
other aspects of the person's experience and
relationships in life, whether these be social,
environmental or cosmic connections? These are
some of the questions that need to be asked in
this exploration of what constitutes health and
healing and which if any of these paradigms will
enhance the wellbeing of our people, our society
and our world.
As previously
stated the concept of `health' differs across
various paradigms. The Oxford dictionary defines
the following words thus: - Health n. state of
being well in body or mind; condition of body:
Healthy n. having or conductive to good health:
Heal v. restore to health; cure; become sound.
Capra (1983) extends the view that "Health is
really a multidimensional phenomenon involving
interdependent physical, psychological, and
social aspects" (p.353). Further on he states
"Health, then is an experience of wellbeing
resulting from a dynamic balance that involves
the physical and psychological aspects of the
organism; as well as its interactions with its
natural and social environment" (p.354).
To begin this
inquiry let us look at our western biomedical
model, its basis, its relevance to health and
its potential limitations in the 1990's. We
could ask the questions `Is it working?' `Can we
afford it?' Does it have all the answers?' What
is the prevailing philosophy that underpins this
biomedical model?
The origins of
Western medicine date back to the time of
Hippocrates who spoke of "...health being
related among environmental influences, ways of
life, and the various components of human nature
" (Capra, 1883, p.341). Unfortunately the
influence of Isaac Newton and Rene Descartes
amongst others, forged a mechanistic and a
reductionist way of viewing people and the world
they inhabited. This view continues to have an
impact on today's biomedical model. Capra (1983)
discusses this effect in the formation of the
biomedical model:
Throughout the
history of Western science the development of
biology has gone hand in hand with that of
medicine. Naturally then, the mechanistic view
of life, once firmly established in biology, has
also dominated the attitudes of physicians
toward health and illness. The influence of the
Cartesian paradigm on medical thought resulted
in the so-called biomedical model which
constitutes the conceptual foundation of modern
scientific medicine. The human body is regarded
as a machine that can be analysed in terms of
its parts; disease is seen as the malfunctioning
of biological mechanisms which are studied from
the point of view of cellular and molecular
biology; the doctor's role is to intervene,
either physically or chemically, to correct the
malfunctioning of a specific mechanism.
(p.118)
Capra (1983)
goes on to say:
The
biomedical model is firmly grounded in
Cartesian thought. Descartes introduced the
strict separation of mind and body, along
with the idea that the body is a machine that
can be understood completely in terms of the
arrangement and functioning of parts. A
healthy person was like a well-made clock in
perfect mechanical condition, a sick person
like a clock whose parts were not functioning
properly. (p. 138)
One of the
major drawbacks or criticisms of the biomedical
models is that it does not view health in a
holistic context. It has a compartmentalised
view in its approach to providing health care.
There are specialists for every aspect of a
persons's makeup, for example, one would go to a
Psychiatrist for emotional problems, a Physician
for medical problems, a Gynaecologist for
`female problems', ad infinitum. Therefore you
can have people who have a range of health
problems being treated by a range of
Specialists. They can spend much of their lives
waiting in the outpatient departments of these
specialty units waiting to have their problems
solved! The signs and symptoms of ill-health are
fitted into `a box labelled with the name of the
disease'. Included with the contents of this box
is all the associated knowledge on how this
disease is to be treated, not unlike a recipe
book! This process almost always occurs in
isolation from other factors in a person's life.
Capra (1983) describes this well when he
says:
By
concentrating on smaller and smaller
fragments of the body, modern medicine often
loses sight of the patient as a human being,
and by reducing health to mechanical
functioning, it is no longer able to deal
with the phenomenon of healing.
(p.118). Often
care is narrowly focussed and one-dimensional
in its approach, relying on blood tests or
X-ray results to define state of health.
There is little recognition of any other
aspect of `the whole person'; of emotional;
social; spiritual or vocational status in
life. There is much anecdotal evidence to
support the experience of depersonalisation
and dehumanisation that occurs within this
model of health care. Obviously
not all medical practitioner are uncaring and
the biomedical model does provide a valuable
role in some instances but the narrow focus
and the continuing separation of body and
mind inherent in this system of health care
does not encourage the natural process of
healing and in many cases could be described
at best as `bandaid treatment'. This narrow
and limited focus that is inherent in this
paradigm, and the inflated status that
Medical Practitioner have in our society,
translate into a dangerous mix of arrogance
and ignorance. The biomedical establishment
could be said to yield an inordinate amount
of power and control at a political level.
This
control maintains the status quo and hence
limits the options of the general population
to the type of health care that is available
to them. Other drawbacks to this model of
health care is that it is not a preventative
model of health and the rapidly spiralling
costs of providing this increasingly
`high-tech' medicine is becoming prohibitive.
In stark
contrast to the western biomedical model is
the philosophies from the Eastern Traditions.
These traditions that include Buddhism,
Hinduism and Taoism share a similar world
view in their understanding and belief in the
overall interconnectedness of all things in
the universe. As stated by Capra
(1975): The
most important characteristic of the Eastern
world view - one could almost say the essence
of it - is the awareness of the unity and
mutual interrelation of all things and
events, the experience of all phenomena in
the world as manifestations of basic oneness.
All things are seen as interdependent and
inseparable parts of this cosmic whole; as
different manifestations of the same ultimate
reality.(p.116,117) Accordingly
the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and
Ayurvedic Medicine from India, both of these
being influenced by that same Eastern world
view of interconnectedness and universality
of all things, approach the notions of health
in totally different ways from those in
western medicine. Both of these would
perceive ill-health as a sign of disharmony
or a `being out of balance' with the natural
laws of life and nature. In TCM
where there is belief in the yin and yang as
both opposing yet complementary forces much
the same as the Tao is seen to be to be the
result of the interplay of opposites. It is
believed that a form of vital energy known as
ch'i maintains the balance between yin and
yang. Wellbeing is the ability to sustain and
maintain this dynamic balance and to be able
to live in harmony with the natural universe.
The TCM approach to healing would be to
assist a person to reconnect with their
natural healing abilities. Ayurvedic
medicine is based on humeral theories. People
are thought be be more influenced by one of
three humors, phelm, bile or wind. They have
a complex body of knowledge that allows them
to assess each particular type and to provide
a wide range of diet and lifestyle options,
which in the Maharishi Ayurveda involves
Transcendental Meditation (TM), to assist a
person to find balance in their life.
Ayurvedic medicine firmly believes in the
notion of universal interconnectedness which
they define as the unified field. The focus
of their approach is to maintain harmony and
balance in a person's life. This is best
described by Lonsdorf, Butler and Brown
(1993): Internal
harmony is perhaps the most salient feature
of all living systems, expressing the
intelligent growth and regulation of all
aspects of nature, from the blossoming of a
rose to the rising of the tides to the
movement of the planets. From cell to
galaxies, all matter of life is arranged to
uphold and express nature's intelligence in a
vast universe of balance and cohesion. In
this way the organised intelligence of the
universe is a collection of many forms or
bits of expressed intelligence, all life but
all organised in different ways..........In
humans, the material essence of nature's
intelligence is called DNA
...(p.13) Ayurvedic
believes that what it offers re-awakens the
body's intelligence and can actually create
changes in the DNA makeup of cells to
re-establish health and healing. Lonsdorf et
al (1993) state: PNI
research has demonstrated that our thoughts
and emotions change our body more swiftly and
effectively than any external medicine,
suggesting that healing is a single organised
process of thought, feelings, and cells
working together, all aspects of health
occurring within the body and mind
simultaneously (p.49). What is
so intriguing in regard to the ancient
Eastern traditions is that their
understanding of health is totally influenced
by their shared belief in the inherent
interconnectedness and the complementarity of
all things in our universe. And that their
notion of interconnectedness increasingly
correlates with what has been found to be
true in the field of quantum physics. In
discussing these very correlations Capra
(1975) writes: In
modern physics, the universe is thus
experienced as a dynamic, inseparable whole
which always includes the observer in an
essential way. In this experience, the
traditional concepts of space and time, of
isolating objects, and of cause and effect,
lose their meaning. Such an experience,
however, is very similar to that of the
Eastern mystics. (p.70) He also
makes the point that the quantum physics view
of the makeup of the universe involves
probability waves and that these waves have a
mathematical quality to them. At
the subatomic level, matter does not exist
with certainty at definite places, but rather
shows "tendencies to exist," and atomic
events do not occur with certainty at
definite times and in definite ways, but
rather show "tendencies to occur". In the
formalism of quantum theory, these tendencies
are expressed as probabilities and are
associated with mathematical quantities which
take the form of waves.......they are
"probability waves," (p,56) These
ideas of Capra's which mention the
mathematical quantities that make up
probability waves which form the basis of
this universe resonate with much of what was
stated and extended a little further by
Reanney(1991): Let
us look more deeply at the concept of beauty.
Many of us, when asked to describe something
`beautiful; would nominate a piece of music.
There is, I believe, a sound scientific
reason for this. there is a far-reaching
relationship between music and mathematics
which goes back to the time of Pythagoras.
Pythagoras showed that the pitch of a musical
note depends on the frequency of its
vibration; if a node is moved halfway along a
vibrating string playing its ground note, the
string plays a note an octave higher and so
on. Modern physics has adopted a similar
`melodic' metaphor in its description of the
hidden levels of atomic substructure.
Electrons occupy discrete energy levels in
atoms. These energy levels can be thought of
and described as, vibrations or `standing
waves'. The basic structure of matter is
musical. p.191). The Death of Forever A New
Future for Human Consciousness Darryl Reanney
Longman Cheshire 1991 p191 The
concept of the make up of the atomic
substructure being mathematical or made up of
vibrations or `standing waves' opens up a
much broader discussion when exploring the
various healing paradigms. One could ask, is
this important? How does this fit in? What
relevance does this have in the overall
scheme of things? I would like to look
seriously at this aspect of these things in
order to show the value of different
paradigms to healing, for example, the role
of sound and colour and touch as valuable
tools in the journey of healing.
Quantum
theory has thus demolished the classical
concepts of solid objects and of strictly
deterministic laws of nature. At the
subatomic level, the solid material objects
of classical physics dissolve into wavelike
patterns of probabilities, and these
patterns, ultimately, do not represent
probabilities of things, but rather
probabilities of
interconnections........Quantum theory thus
reveals a basic oneness of the universe. p.
56 & 57 Reanney
p191 ...I
believe that consciousness, the source of the
aesthetic sense, experiences reality
directly. And reality - the hidden structure
of the universe - has a harmonic
configuration. To put this another way, there
is a deep, albeit subtle, relationship
between the harmonic structures of some
`moving' musical composition and the
underlying musical foundation of physics,
which consciousness tunes in
to. Said
simply, if we want to describe the universe
as consciousness `knows' it, we should stop
thinking of it as a machine or a system or a
process and start thinking of it as a
song.
Ellie Large
© June 1996
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