But there is considerable resistance from the doctors in this area, so that treatments are not reimbursed because they do not prescribe this type of alternative treatments.
AM: There are two questions I would like to clarify, the first is that this is not alternative medicine. When we talked about alternative treatments, we are talking about a therapist who is not licensed in medicine, has a form of medicine, sees people who are sick. They are called unconventional therapists, naturopaths, whatever you want to call them, it is already recognized in law. Another thing is what I practice, I am a doctor, a college licensed by Portuguese Medicine University, with some European curriculum, what I carry out is an integrated medical approach. I integrate all the knowledge I had in college, physiology, of biopathology, of immunology with some knowledge of traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic, homeopathy, of homotoxicology and integrate all this and see people in a holistic way, so it's more appropriated to say integrated. Sure that homeopathic medicines are not reimbursed in this country, but in others are, perhaps because governments have come to the conclusion that people are treated this way are healthier, spend less time in the hospital and use less reimbursed medicines. There is the famous case of a German insurance company that lowers prices for people who say they are treated with homeopathy, which do meditation and yoga. People more concerned about their health, do not smoke, drink less alcohol, are more aware with food, with the body, so hopefully they are less sick.
The Portuguese are one the populations that more resort to self-medicate in European terms, there is a national dependency to chemicals. However, while visiting the countries of northern Europe, few doctors prescribe drugs, saying that the body will slowly regenerate. How do you explain our addiction? It's a mindset?
AM: It is the mentality, but also, as people having more money, was demanding more health care and now people want to go to the doctor with a child who has fever and does not want to leave without an antibiotic, because someone told them that this type of medication is effective. Now look, a doctor at a health center, general and family physician has 30 people to handle, it has little theoretical resources to tell a mother that cannot be. I quite understand my colleagues, because people are very forceful and if the doctor does not pass the prescription they go to any other doctor. What is more important is to have an awareness campaign to let people know that flu has its own timing. No use self-medication. There is evidence that a viral flu lasts three to four days, taking painkillers, anti-inflammatory drugs, or not. The chicken soup never hurt anyone, in terms of medical science we can say that to the patient because our grandparents have done it for us, but many doctors who never ate this soup in childhood will not tell that to their patients, because is not written anywhere. I recently read a study but I don't remember which university, I think it was at Harvard, who studied the chicken broth and the cook chicken releases a protein that is the cysteine that will have effects on the bronchi. Here is the scientific explanation that chicken soup is good for you, now tell me how many of these home remedies should we do not mention to patients, for fear of being ridiculed, just because it is not proven. The impression is that science cannot prove everything, it seems there is a lag time between what is popular knowledge and the doctor who merges that in the integrative medicine, i.e., a doctor can integrate this knowledge to their patients. I feel there is a gap in what is proven and what people know empirically that does well. I found it astonishing that has to be scientifically proven that even the chicken soup is good for health anyway. It makes you wonder how far we can say that something is not proven? The current scientific thinking is so, what is not proven is not valid, only that we cannot forget the test of time. The homeopathic medicine, which homotoxicology is within my area and we are talking about drugs with 70 years of proven therapeutic efficacy, without little or no side effects, so, why I need more proof? It is essential a study involving a thousand people, in whom 500 take the drug for a particular pathology, and the other another type of medicine to prove that one is better than the other? I need to get this knowledge is that colleges and by colleagues who are in it for a long time, also needs to be included in books and from there you do not need anything else. I'll also add that people who are against the homeopathic claim say it is sugar water, because they took 20 bottles at once and that did not have any effect so they say it is a placebo. They are completely wrong. The drugs work by homotoxicology dose, means that an acute event, we give the medicine every fifteen minutes, because it will stimulate a number of cytokines, which are signaling molecules in the body that are being activated depending on, as the effect we have. Therefore, no good comes by taking twenty bottles, because it acts as a dose. This is the first point. According to people who are against this type of drug, maintain that there is no matter in this medicine, why? These drugs are diluted and dynamised and go beyond the Avogadro number, i.e. we do not find substances, because they are in trace amounts (at10 raised to -23 there is not indeed substance), but there is the vibrational frequency of this matter. The failure to find, does not mean that there isn't any, we do not have equipment to measure it. Another important thing is that only about ten years ago we discovered these cytokines, these signaling molecules that explain the results of this type of medication. It seems once again as I mentioned before there is a gap between what we can proved and secondly, the medications work who prescribes sees the results, but in the past we did not known how to explain why.
These new areas of medicine are not yet part of the program of medical education, why? In Portugal we are very conservatives?
AM: I think it's a matter of time. It's the romantic way I see things. The younger generations are awake, I have many patients who are medical students, who will be future doctors. These will have a different opening and will want for them to study, learn and practice with their patients because they had a health problem that was solved in this way. Now, when? No idea, across Europe there are already integrated medicine courses, up postgraduate medical biology. The undergraduate education in Italy, in pharmacology is a subspecialty of homotoxicology / homeopathy. So how much we have to wait? I have no idea. Acupuncture is a medical approach extremely precious and beautiful to learn, but studied in the light of modern scientific concepts. It is a traditional medicine that has five thousand years, who has to prove what? Only very recently acupuncture is as a post-graduate for doctors. We lagged, but I believe that the Order will understand that there are specialties that are not studied in Portugal and will create a group of doctors who can transmit that knowledge.
Another point of disagreement is the national vaccination campaigns that convey the idea that if people that are not vaccinated may die and cast panic in populations. This was the case of influenza A and cervix cancer that only prevents one type of virus. We have the impression that is a huge business for companies that create these drugs.
AM: Vaccines are a very controversial issue. Much has been written on the subject. There is this general perception that is good for everyone and I think we should be more careful in administering mass vaccinations. They actually came to fill a big problem that were infectious diseases, but like all the excess must be weighed. There are doctors who are very pro and vaccinate against everything and others who are more cautious. Although not only physicians in this area, especially old pediatricians have some caution in prescribing vaccines, they assigned the ones included in the national plan and the rest are more moderate. It is not consensual. We cannot ask people not to take them what I ask is that you seek, look what is written, the appropriate side effects and make the decision in full awareness.
As in the case of influenza A?
AM: What I felt that there was a very short period to maturity of the vaccine, there was not enough time. You cannot have knowledge of an outbreak in February and vaccines are in the market in August, September. It is not possible. Who knows something about the formulation, research and experiments with drugs know it is not possible. I advised people to be careful I do not say don't take them that is a personal choice.
