The Traditional medicine reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Traditional medicine

The term traditional medicine is most often used to describe medical practices before the application of scientific method to the practice of medicine. Institutions where traditional medicine is studied cover the following subject areas:

• Herbal medicine
• Ayurvedic medicine
• Acupuncture
• traditional Chinese medicine
• Homeopathy

Sometimes, the term traditional medicine is used to describe modern scientific medicine. The usual argument is that modern scientific medicine is corrupt because of the influence of pharmaceutical companies. In this view, the vanguard of medicine is in the herbalists, acupuncturists, and homeopaths. Since practitioners of these disciplines do not use the products of pharmaceutical companies, they do not receive government funds for research of their techniques. Practitioners of scientific medicine are called traditionalistsbecause of their perceived rigid attachment to the poor quality, corrupt science arising from the government and pharmaceutical industry.

Scientific methods are currently being applied to the study of traditional medicine and many studies have been done. The results of such research have expanded the pharmacopia available to practitioners of modern medicine.

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