Anita Ralph
Does Complexity Theory Provide an explanation of the Underlying Mechanisms Behind the Practice of Western Herbal Medicine?
Abstract
Western Herbal Medicine (WHM) is a discrete system of medicine that has at its heart a person-centred not disease-centred approach that has been described as an ‘ecological’ view of health and disease (Barker 1991). Practitioners of WHM place importance on the background of the person’s condition, the dynamic causative factors of disease-emergence, the person’s ‘vitality’ and ‘constitution’, the positive relationship between therapist and patient and the use of whole-plant medicines in individualised complex formulae (EHPA 1994). Contrary to WHM philosophy, much research focuses on the drug-like application of isolated plant extracts to conventional Western biomedical diagnoses (Mills 2002). Developments within biology point to a new understanding of complex systems at work in biological organisms which is encouraging a more holistic view of medicine (Byrne 1998, Innes et al 2005). As part of this movement, complexity theory is receiving overwhelming support from health commentators and scientists, who have praised its more ‘holistic’ approach to the science of medicine. Concepts of complexity science have also struck a chord with complementary and alternative health researchers. Could complexity theory validate the current practice of WHM and thus enable development of new research designs in WHM that investigate the mechanisms of WHM within its own paradigm?
