There are different methods of treatment but holistic medicine stands out. This is because it takes a deep look at ailments from the psychological and spiritual aspects, among others to provide a cure. A naturopath, Dr Gilbert Ezengige spoke with WALE ADEPOJU on the subject.
How can diseases be kept atbay? It is by the adoption of holistic medicine for diagnosis and treatment, says a naturopath, Dr Gilbert Ezengige.
Holistic medicine, he said, ensures that health care providers treat patients completely because the human body is not wholly a physical entity like a mechanical device or machine.
He said holistic medicine is becoming popular among health practitioners, adding that it addresses the totality of man’s health.
Describing holistic medicine, he said, it is an assemblage of practices, modalities and techniques that are relevant to an individual’s total health, saying they are physical, emotional, mental, social and spiritual.
He said it publicises the teaching that an individual should strive to achieve equilibrium within and establish the necessary harmony between himself and his environment.
Ezengige, who is also an iridologist, said health practitioners who are indifferent to holistic medicine may be opting for irrelevance as the global age advances.
He said: “There are links between our physical organs and our higher faculties. The realities of such links are encountered frequently in our daily conversations and expressions. Statements such as I render my heart-felt apology, I can’t stomach it any longer, he hasn’t got enough liver, his circumstances make him to shoulder a lot of responsibilities, among others are indicative of organs/emotions links and relationship.
“From long time observation, many cultures have come to know that various emotions produce certain disorders in man and these speculations are well founded as science has being investigating and confirming them. It has been ascertained for instance that; an individual who is in the habit of always bottling up his emotional hurts is more likely to experience gastrointestinal discomforts and ulcers; hyper aggressive disposition causes a lot of white blood cells to flood our bloodstreams; uncontrolled anxiety and stress impacts negatively on the cardiovascular system leading to various types of heart ailments; frequent frowning add lots of wrinkles to your face and makes you age faster; constant unexpressed anger promotes gallbladder stone formation, grief and sorrow hastens various types of heart diseases and lowers your immunity significantly.”
Ezengige said there is a positive means of harnessing this emotional thought energy for healing, saying patients are taught to use it by the practitioners.
“The harbouring of fear is one of the negative ways of applying this neutral energy because human organs are harmed by it. The connection between human emotions/mental state and physical organs is fairly appreciated by all practitioners of medicine and health counselors. Disciplines such as psychology, psychotherapy and psychiatry are proofs of such acknowledgment,” he added.
He said holistic medicine discards the view that stamps spiritual or material approach as all that are needed for effective cure.
“A holistic medical practitioner gratefully accepts from creation any system that engenders equilibrium in his patients. The word ‘patient’ used in describing the sick person speaks volume. Patients must exercise patience before the forces of nature awakened through prayers, herbal administration, massage, nutritional therapy, homeopathy, among others will begin to act on them.
“If only patients that change their doctors frequently assimilate the meaning of patient, they would save themselves so much disappointments,” he said.
He said complementary, alternative and traditional medicine advocate the use of natural and non-invasive products and techniques in diagnosis and treatment. “Practitioners in this category who completely imbibe the philosophy of holistic medicine will not delay in referring surgical cases to surgeons for timely intervention. Such a referral do not depress them; instead, it awakens in them the feeling of gratitude to God for permitting and making ways in which health can be restored to the sick.
“In like manner, an allopathic practitioner that has welcomed the principles of holistic medicine will not tenaciously hold on to his patients that are suffering from chronic diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, cancer, arthritis, among others, to the patients’ detriment. He should encourage such patients to source for alternative health care, especially when there is such desire to visit natural health practitioners,” he added.
The concept of equilibrium maintenance, he said, was fundamental to the practice of holistic medicine. Whenever anything upsets an individual’s state of harmony, balance, equilibrium or homeostasis, that person or his environment suffers, he added.
Holistic medicine practitioners, he said, do not regard germs as the primary culprits in disease conditions that befall people, adding: “Different types of germs have always existed and will continue to exist. Why? Oh, we need some of them to ferment our drinks, decompose our manure in the field for maximum crop yield at harvest time. Some microbes help in synthesizing different types of vitamins in our intestinal tracts. So useful are these microorganisms (harmless and harmful types) that without them the pollution level in the world would have reached an unimaginable level making it impossible for people and their loved ones to breathe fresh air.
Their roles in biodegradation are unequalled.”
Truly some of the microorganisms portend serious health hazards to humans, animals and the plant kingdom, he added.
“However, as long as we do not turn ourselves to heaps of wastes by indulging in unhealthy diets and poising our emotional, mental and spiritual states, all microorganisms; beneficial and non-beneficial, harmful and harmless ones will only be in transit within our bodies. If we adopt wrong lifestyles the strangers in transit become tenants. With further deterioration in health, they begin to lay claim to our bodies thereby becoming land lords.
“The destructive forces in this instance start to gain upper hand over the constructive forces; catabolism over anabolism, disintegration over integration,” he said.
Ezengige said cure starts from within (centre), saying an individual who has lost hope on life or fed up with life, as it is commonly expressed, is a difficult patient to treat.
“Recovery from his illness is made almost impossible by his state of mind. He falls sadly in the category of an incurable patient with a curable disease; the nightmare of any practicing physician.
