    |
 |
  |
  |
 |
|
Home Welcome to
AlterMed
Research
Foundation Our Mission AlterMed Research Foundation, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt non-profit organization based in Fort Collins, Colorado, is dedicated to the promotion of scientific research and education of complementary and alternative medicine (or integrative medicine) to manage, treat, and prevent human chronic illness & cancer, and to promote healthful living. We
bridge evidence-based Complementary & Alternative Medicine
(CAM) to
conventional medicine by promoting quality research and education. With
our world-renowned advisory board with both
CAM and conventional
research review as well as clinical expertise -
we ensure quality CAM research is conducted,
peer-reviewed,
and meeting highest conventional research standards;
thus enabling more proven medical options to
be discovered for cancer and chronic illness.
We also
host quality evidence-based medical conferences for physicians, nurses,
allied professionals, students, and the public. AlterMed's Successes AlterMed was formed in May of 2006 to address the under-funding issue for CAM research and education. Over the past years, AlterMed has successfully trained Northern Colorado medical residents in CAM topics. AlterMed initiated and hosted the first very successful Colorado Integrative Medicine Conference: focus on mind-body medicine in 2009. Our next conference will be held during July 15-17, 2011. Both the research and education portion of our mission are on-track. For the research portion of our mission, we have in plan to fund a mini-grant in 2011 to promote more CAM research to address human chronic illness and cancer. We continue to build a CAM community that values evidence-based integrative medicine and bridging to conventional medicine. Why Fund Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) Research? Have you known or do you know someone you love with a chronic illness or cancer? If yes, have you seen, heard of, or experienced the suffering? Would you like to figure out a way to alleviate or prevent human suffering due to these degenerative illnesses? When conventional medicine is ineffective in treating cancer and chronic illness, more patients and their families are evaluating and using complementary and alternative medicine on their own without the support of conventional medical communities and insurance companies. This can be a very lonely and scary process without yielding very good odds. AlterMed's founder has been there, can attest to this experience, and deeply desires that someday conventional physicians and insurance companies will have the quality research results they need to help and support patients with effective alternatives. Thus, to increase proven medical options, it makes sense to scientifically research CAM where conventional medicine is ineffective. Why
not leave it to the government or the pharmaceutical
companies to fund this research? According to the American Cancer Society 2007 cancer statistics, cancer accounts for 1 out of 4 deaths in the US. According to the Center of Disease Control and Prevention - chronic illness accounts for 70% of all deaths in the U.S. Have you known or do you know someone with chronic illness or cancer? If yes, then you know that depending on the type of disease, conventional medicine is often inadequate to address it and yet alternative medicine claims abound on cures and treatments. To increase proven medical options, it makes sense to evaluate alternative medicines where conventional medicine is ineffective or offers no hope. According to NIH NCCAM, two-thirds of Americans use some form of CAM (Complementary and Alternative Medicine) each year. Today, chronic illness and cancer patients along with their families search on the Internet for alternative treatments without much conventional support. In our mainstream medical infrastructure, who has the role to help the patients and their families sort out the wheat from the chaff on alternative medicine? Mainstream medical doctors and insurance rely on quality research studies when making recommendations and reimbursements respectively; once a CAM treatment is proven, then it is integrated with mainstream medicine. However, the progress of finding effective CAM treatment via research is very slow because only 1% of NIH biomedical research funding is allocated to CAM research. There is also little funding support from the pharmaceutical companies because researching natural supplements that cannot be patented does not allow these commercial entities to recoup their costs. United States healthcare (western medicine) is driven by a strong pharmaceutical approach, which other countries around the world tend to model and has been working reasonably well for many acute and other diseases; however, holistic & preventative approaches, which can benefit so many human beings, fall by the way side because the research funding is severely lacking in these areas. From the NIH NCCAM reports covering the last 10 years, we have learned that quality CAM research designs and the number of experienced CAM researchers are severely lacking; thus NCCAM is continually focused on training as one of their objectives. The perception of poor CAM research quality is common among the conventional medical and insurance industries; this view is further validated with NCCAM findings. To our donors, AlterMed Research Foundation provides a layer of CAM expert review by world-renowned (including reviewers & contributors for top-tier international journals, such as the Journal of the American Medical Association, Lancet, & the New England Journal of Medicine) CAM international advisory board to ensure that any funding targeted for quality research will leverage current CAM review expert knowledge base as well as meet mainstream research standards. How You Can Help to Steer Human Health toward Wellness by Bridging evidence-based CAM to Conventional Health Care We solicit your support to help us raise more funding to promote integrative medicine research and education to address cancer and chronic illness because every human's untreatable illness diminishes us in some way as a whole. On the research front, we are especially focused on mind-body medicine in addition to other CAM areas. On the education front, we invite you to partner (as a sponsor, exhibitor, attendee, and/or volunteer) with AlterMed to create the next successful evidence-based Colorado Integrative Medicine Conference (cIMc 2011: focus on mind-body medicine and lifestyle management) for health professionals scheduled during July 15-17, 2011. We are adding a poster session to our 2011 conference for our attendees to showcase their research. To donate, volunteer, attend a fundraiser, contact us, or to learn more - please click on the corresponding tabs on this page. Join us at the July 15-17, 2011 Colorado Integrative Medicine Conference! Thank you for your support to bridge complementary and alternative medicine to conventional medicine so we can together increase credible medical options to manage, treat, and prevent human chronic illness and cancer. |
