Wien Klin Wochenschr. 2002 Dec; 114(23-24): 958-62.

[Alternative and natural science therapy forms: incompatible contrast]

Turnheim K.

Institut für Pharmakologie, Universität Wien, Wien, Osterreich. klaus.turnheim@univie.ac.at

In spite of the accomplishments of science-oriented medicine, we are still confronted with a multitude of "alternative" or "complementary" therapies which claim to heal "holistically" without adverse effects. Common to alternative treatment methods, which are several or many centuries old, is the notion that a special force ("vis vitalis", "entelechy", "spiritual bioforce", etc.) is responsible for life that, ultimately, cannot be investigated. According to this perception, which is termed "vitalism", diseases are a result of changes in the immaterial force of life. Therefore, treatments have to be directed at this central regulator ("regulatory therapy"). The medicine that is based on the natural sciences, in contrast, presumes that all expressions of life including diseases are amenable to critical and rational analysis. According to this school of thought, a causal therapy can be derived only from a detailed knowledge of the various body functions down to the molecular level and the effects of drugs on these functions. Corresponding therapeutic theories have to be verified or falsified experimentally, excluding bias as much as possible. Using such "objective" methods, a statistical assessment of the beneficial and adverse effects of a treatment may be possible ("evidence-based medicine"). In the final analysis, an incompatibility of scientific concepts is at the heart of the controversy between alternative treatment methods and the medicine based on natural sciences.