Integrative Medicine

The Integrative Medicine Postgraduate Educational and Interactive Forum (IMEDUCA) platform is independent and voluntary. It was created for doctors who provide healthcare in their clinics, including in the field of integrative medicine, and for young doctors who are interested in this form of healthcare and would like to be educated in this area. Our goal is to provide scientific knowledge in integrative medicine and thus raise its level in Slovakia. It follows on from the 15-year professional activity of the Slovak Bioregenerative Medicine Association, a.s. of the Slovak Medical Society (SLS), which was founded in 2010 as the only association with an orientation towards integrative medicine in SLS. You can view the history of the company on www.ssbrm.sk

Slovakia does not have a built-in structure for the medical field of integrative medicine, like other Western European countries and the USA:

1. Department (Institute) of Integrative Medicine at Medical Universities, which teaches the basics of integrative medicine as a regular subject with a written and oral exam,
2. clinics and outpatient clinics of integrative medicine,
3. scientific research institutions of integrative medicine for basic and clinical research.

Slovakia is starting from almost zero in integrative medicine.

We cannot hinder the development of scientific integrative medicine in Slovakia, on the contrary, it is necessary to support it. The later classical medicine accepts it as its useful partner, the sooner unscientific healing and patient misguidance will spread in Slovakia! Currently, it is a very undesirable progressive phenomenon.

I do not want to harm talented healers with many years of experience with this assessment, ev. even with a family tradition of several generations of healers. but there are actually a few of them.

In Germany, healers (Heilpraktiker) are graduates of a 3–4-year university degree in the field of healer, and based on the diploma they obtain authorization to practice their profession and are constantly obliged to undergo postgraduate education and their activities are controlled by the Ministry of Health. Healers cooperate intensively with doctors and can also participate in some educational certified seminars addressed to integrative physicians.

Explanation of Why the Name Integrative Medicine is Correct and Why the Integrated Medicine is Incorrect.

Integrative is an adjective that denotes, for example, a group of experts who are independent in their activities and professionally communicate with another professional group and enrich it with their knowledge, i.e. integrate their knowledge into another professional group, join this group, but can also exist professionally independently.

Integrated is an adjective that denotes, for example, a group of experts that is an inseparable part of a larger professional group, is inseparably professionally connected with it into one whole.

Noun integration – is an incomplete process – unification.

Noun integrity – is a complete process – permanent unification, connection and wholeness.

• Integrative medicine is causal medicine, which in Dif. Dg. identifies complex causes and their mutual relationships that led to the disease manifested by clinical symptomatology and to the disruption of the internal homeostasis of the patient’s regulatory systems.
• Perceives the patient holistically (whole), is interested in his physical, emotional, mental and spiritual status and does not focus only on the symptom (s) in a partial part of the organism. It also analyzes his relationships in the family, at the workplace and among friends. This newly developing branch of integrative medicine is called psycho-somato-social medicine.
• It integrates into classical medicine and helps it with its procedures in patient health care by effective bioregeneration of the organism, accelerating the patient’s recovery and his inclusion in the work process.

Integrative Medicine

• Supports the re-establishment of the balance of regulatory systems in the body in a natural way, is based on some diagnostic and treatment methods of traditional medical procedures in individual countries, historically verified for centuries by medical and medical practice. The effectiveness and safety of these treatment methods were accepted into integrative medicine only based on the results of several independent clinical studies.
• Uses phytotherapy, nutritional therapy, balneotherapy and physiotherapy, exercise therapy, orthomolecular therapy, bioregenerative therapy, psychotherapy, acupuncture, homeopathy, regulatory and information medicine, etc. in treatment.
• It has its own scientific research institutes that verify traditional medical methods for their safety and effectiveness, and further develop new natural medical methods, investigate bioenergetic information human fields and the possibility of their use in diagnostics and treatment.
• The patient is an active partner in the treatment process, takes responsibility for his recovery, exercises patience and discipline while adhering to a comprehensive treatment program (protocol), which includes a diet regimen, individually designed exercise therapy, psychohygiene, individual psychotherapy with targeted analysis and therapy of his problems in the emotional and psychological area (emotional detoxification). Psychotherapy also includes education on the correct principles of communication intelligence, philosophical therapy and ethical therapy (meaning of life, recognition of moral values ​​and performing moral deeds, correct model of thinking, collectivism with work commitment for the benefit of a meaningful whole with the correct moral idea).
• The emphasis is placed on disease prevention and patient education in the field ​ of healthy lifestyle and in sensitive perception of changes in one’s organism (communication with one’s organism) and in adopting the basic axiom of not overloading the individual psychological and physical capabilities of one’s own organism.
• The patient, as an equal subject of the tripartite relationship: patient – physician – healthcare intermediary, chooses his or her own method of treatment.
• Most patients choose a combination of classical and integrative medicine, some patients choose only classical medicine and others only integrative medicine to treat their illness (statistics do not include data for the Slovak Republic).

The concept of integrative medicine is based on the bioregeneration of the organism and the establishment of a dynamic balance of regulatory systems. Integrative medicine reflects urgent societal and medical requirements in a rapidly developing knowledge society for the diagnosis of early stages of depletion of the organism’s compensatory reserves and the integration of bioregeneration programs into the prevention of disease (primary prevention) for employees and entrepreneurs with increased workload accompanied by extended working hours, with constant stress, lack of time for rest and proper nutrition. Integrative medicine also integrates into treatment procedures in classical medicine in order to accelerate the process of recovery and improvement of the health status of a sick patient leading to a reduction in incapacity for work (secondary prevention). The concept is based on the criteria of today’s society, where health and long-term work capacity are among the most important factors of the economic existence of an individual in society.

• with an open mind and relationship to traditional medicine and to new natural methods in the developing integrative medicine, preferring natural treatment of the organism with gentle and sensitive intervention in the regulatory systems of the organism with natural substances in order to return the disturbed regulatory systems to physiological dynamic balance,
• with empathy for the patient and with an interest in healing the patient,
• with creative thinking in phytotherapy and intensive monitoring of their patients, because based on many years of practical experience on the safety and effectiveness of various combinations of phytotherapeutics, they create new original combinations in treatment protocols,
• with creative thinking and interest in creating new projects for clinical studies in integrative medicine, and thus support the development of scientific integrative medicine,
• with fearlessness to lead an open dialogue about some ineffective therapeutic procedures, both in classical and integrative medicine,
• with publishing skills and with enthusiasm for continuous education in favor of quality diagnostics and therapy.