Holistic Medicine: Using the ABC Principle to Create a Personalized Approach to Holistic Healing

You can learn to build your own effective individualized program of holistic healing care that includes practitioner-provided and self-care interventions – but you have to understand where each option fits into the big picture. A lot of publications on CAM (complimentary and alternative medicine) are either introductory overview encyclopedias of treatment modalities or in depth explanations of one type of CAM. But, all CAM treatments — just as with Western medicine — are not the same, in terms of their potential to help different people with different types of health conditions.

As a consumer, you probably find it hard to decide what is best for you. Many people combine treatments without giving much thought to interactions — good or bad — between them, let alone the potential for the package of care to help them overall.

Picking treatments for a specific health problem just because you prefer something more familiar or easier to do, rather than something less familiar and harder to try could keep you from maximizing your results. And, picking treatments — or, sometimes, providers, because they helped Aunt Alma is no guarantee that you’ll get what you need to solve your problems.

For many people with chronic illnesses, putting together a handful of vitamins and minerals and herbs is a way to start, but it is usually not enough. True healing is a complex but rewarding journey, not an overnight cure from a magic pill. Putting your options into a larger perspective will make it much clearer for you to know what to do.

The ABC principles refers to three different concepts that are used as a basis to help you determine an effective treatment for specific health problems such as fibromyalgia, diabetes, thyroid, ms (multiple sclerosis), lyme disease, and lupus via alternative medicine methods.

The ABC Principle:

§ Assess: Assess your options and how they might help you. Re-assess the benefits and risks before you begin and periodically throughout treatment for each intervention and for the package of care that you choose.

§ Balance: Balance yourself as a living system whose body parts all play different, essential, and interrelated roles within you, by balancing the elements of your treatment package to serve your ability as a whole not only to survive, but also to thrive.

§ Coordinate: Coordinate the elements of your treatment plan as a whole, interconnected system of care intended to balance you, not as a patchwork collection of things-I’d-like-to-try-and-see-what-helps-each-separate-symptom.

The ABC Principle is a way to create your own individualized plan for getting the most benefit and least risk from the integrated package of care that you will develop.