International Conference on Holistic Medicine and Holistic Nursing July 14-15, 2016 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Proper Nutrition is the basis for optimum health and wellbeing. Holistic nutrition is the modern natural approach to developing a healthy balanced diet while taking into account the person as whole. Holistic nutrition is considered to be part of holistic health.

Holistic nutrition focuses on:

Educating yourself on basic nutritional terms

Incorporating natural and organic foods

Overcoming obstacles in practicing holistic nutrition

Creating simple holistic menus

Developing a customized holistic diet

Addressing the role of natural holistic supplements

Reviewing the latest nutritional studies

Addressing chronic health conditions with holistic nutrition

Holistic Nursing is the art and science of caring for the whole person. It is based on the belief that dynamic mind-body-spirit interactions are ongoing and impact a person's ability to grow and heal. Holistic nurses aim to promote health and wellness as they facilitate their client's growth and healing. Health is a perception of wellness, and a quality of life. Holistic nurses work with people in all settings and at all phases of life. Their primary goal is to facilitate people to live their lives as fully as possible, in all situations.

With a history of 2000 to 3000 years, Traditional Chinese Medicine has formed a unique system to diagnose and cure illness. The Traditional Chinese Medicine approach is fundamentally different from that of Western medicine. In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the understanding of the human body is based on the holistic understanding of the universe as described in Daoism, and the treatment of illness is based primarily on the diagnosis and differentiation of syndromes.

Acupuncture originates from China and has been practiced there for thousands of years. Although there are records of acupuncture being used hundreds of years ago in Europe, it was during the second half of the twentieth century it began to spread rapidly in Western Europe, the United States and Canada.

Acupuncture involves the insertion of very thin needles through the patient's skin at specific points on the body - the needles are inserted to various depths. The medical community is not in conclusive agreement about how acupuncture works scientifically. However, we do know that it does have some therapeutic benefits, including pain relief and alleviation from nausea caused by chemotherapy.

Many people believe that products labeled "natural" are always safe and good for them. This is not necessarily true. Herbal medicines do not have to go through the testing that drugs do. Some herbs, such as comfrey and ephedra, can cause serious harm. Some herbs can interact with prescription or over-the-counter medicines.

Holistic medicines are not always the harmless nostrums that many patients and even some physicians think, but may actually contribute to cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, researchers warned in a review covering 44 years of research into the subject.

Many such products, including aloe vera, ginkgo biloba, and ginseng, and green tea, can interact with conventional cardiovascular drugs and lead to serious adverse reactions.

It is common practice in many physical therapy clinics for a patient to be treated by multiple practitioners, and often by assistants, technicians or aides. Traditional Physical Therapy involves:

Sports injuries

Workers compensation

Auto accidents

Pain relief

Manual therapy such as soft tissue and scar mobilization, myofascial release, joint mobilization, stretching and passive range of motion

Instruction in therapeutic exercises to help restore balance to weakened or dysfunctional muscles

Core strength training

Instruction in posture and body mechanics for back and neck safety

Instruction in workplace safety/ ergonomics

Instruction in balance and proprioception, fall prevention

Gait training

Sensory integration

People have used complementary and alternative medicine practices for thousands of years in pursuit of health and well-being. However, rigorous, well-designed clinical trials for many complementary and alternative medicine therapies are often lacking; therefore, the safety and effectiveness of many CAM therapies are uncertain. The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) is sponsoring research designed to fill this knowledge gap by building a scientific evidence base about CAM therapies—whether they are safe, whether they work for the conditions for which people use them and, if so, how they work.

Complementary and alternative medicine therapies and medical systems are widely used and available in the United States. They include diverse products and practices such as dietary supplements and botanicals, traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture, mind-body medicine, and therapeutic massage.

Unani medicine is ancient Greek medicine that has evolved within the Muslim world for the past 13 centuries (Unani is an Arabic spelling of Ionian, meaning Greek). Greek medicine, greatly simplified for presentation here, was based on the concept of balancing body humors. They either fell out of balance, which might yield diseases (depending on circumstances), or were restored to balance to heal diseases. The system involved four elements, thus differing from the Ayurvedic system of three doshas and the Chinese system of five elements. The original Greek and the resulting Unani systems involve these four elements: earth, air, water, and fire; along with four natures: cold, hot, wet, and dry; and four humors: blood (which is hot/wet), phlegm (cold/wet), yellow bile (hot/dry), and black bile (cold/dry).

Ayurveda, which literally means the science of life (Ayur = Life, Veda = Science), ayurveda is an ancient medical science which was developed in India thousands of years ago.