CAM and Medical Education
Medicine today is experiencing a paradigm shift. Over the past century and consistent with a patient preference for holistic medical care, an increasingly knowledgeable patient population is now fueling the CAM movement by seeking alternative to traditional treatments. These therapies include, but are not limited to, acupuncture, massage therapy, herbal medicines and mind-body techniques

What is CAM
CAM stands for complementary and alternative medicine
Complementary medicine refers to therapies and / or products that are generally used in addition to conventional treatments. Alternative medicine generally refers to therapies and / or products that are used instead of conventional treatments.

Communities of color have practiced positive health maintenance for centuries, drawing upon our physical, social, and spiritual heritage. The Holistic Education and Health Network (HEHN) are poised to take the leadership role in the movement to integrate positive health practices into our overall strategies for health and wellness. The mission of the Holistic Education & Health Network is to bring community resources together to educate the African-American community about alternative and complementary prevention and treatment services.

Common Reason for Using CAM Therapies:
· Chronic or reoccurring pain- particularly back pain
· Many (54%) believe combining conventional medicine with CAM therapies helps
· A medical professional recommended the use of a CAM therapy
· Belief that conventional medicine could not help with a particular problem
· Conventional medicine is too expensive

Results from a major new telephone survey indicate that approximately 36 percent of Americans adults use some form of complementary or alternative medicine (CAM). When prayer for ones health included as a CAM therapies the number jumps to 62 percent. Other findings indicate that women are more frequent users that men of CAM therapies as are people with higher education. The survey also indicates that blacks are more likely than whites or Asians to use CAM therapies when you include prayer for ones health.
The report, in addition to other similar reports, suggests that CAM is here to stay as a significant part of our healthcare system and that wide variety of people from varying races and socio-economic backgrounds turn to CAM use for a variety of reasons. There are many potential benefits when using CAM therapies and products, and it is important as well as to educated oneself of the benefits.

The Holistic Education & Health Network invites you to join us for our second annual health fair. The event is slated for April 7th 2006, in Austin, Texas. We expect to draw approximately 1000 Austin and surrounding county residents for this event. We will present a more comprehensive perspective highlighting natural methods of health care interventions and management based upon the philosophy that health is more than just the absence of diseases. A spectacular array of events are scheduled with healthy cooking classes, panel discussions on alternative medicine and other activities that encourage the development of personal responsibility for positive physical, mental, and spiritual health. Honored speakers will be Dr. A. Kweku Andoh: A British educated ethno botanist who addresses natural healing. www.northscaleinstitute.com and his wife Kali Sichen a nutritionist.

We plan to wrap up our with a seminar featuring well known vegetarian, civil rights activist and a drum major for equal rights and nutritional consultant, with Mother Kali Schien. Kali Sichen was born in North Carolina in 1945 into a newspaper publishing family. She completed her undergraduate degree in Nutrition at California State University in 1977, and completed the academic portion of the program in Traditional Oriental Medicine in 1982. As a student at CSU, she developed the first nutrition program to address hyperactivity in children (now called attention deficit disorder ADD). This nutrition program was used at the college child care center, and was overseen and approved by the USDA.