I’m a big fan of tai chi and yoga; they are a wonderful exercise for young and old — especially tai chi for the elderly. They also provide terrific and sustaining lifestyle changes to deal with stress. The Mayo Clinic website just published a nice series of articles about tai chi and yoga that can …

(This is part 3 of new contributor Dr Alan Mease‘s series on Integrative Holistic Medicine. Part 1 and part 2 are here) Integrative holistic medicine is the emerging medicine of the future. Its values are significantly different and are best described by The Declaration for a New Medicine from the Bravewell Collaborative. Declaration for A NEW MEDICINE …

Those of you with high cholesterol will be happy to learn that there are some legitimate options to your statin pills. Many people cannot tolerate the extremely popular statin pills, especially from side effects of muscle aches. But there’s now some very strong evidence that herbal medicines, including red yeast rice, can be at least …

(This is part 2 of new contributor Dr Alan Mease‘s 5-part series on Integrative Holistic Medicine. Part 1 is here.) What makes man unique is his consciousness, which exists even in infants and can be simply understood as the realms of waking, dreaming and deep sleeping. Central to the unifying theory of integrative holistic medicine …

It’s always hard to find good research on herbs and vitamin supplements; one website I recommend is the Mayo Clinic (Drugs and Supplements – MayoClinic.com.) They have a nice collection of the top few dozen treatments. The same good folks at Mayo Clinic also have a nice, free weekly e-newsletter called “Housecall”, which you can subscribe …

(This is the first of hopefully many pieces by our new contributor, Dr Alan Mease, chief of pediatrics at Beijing’s United Family Hospital). Here is part 2, part 3 As a physician I have long recognized that caring for patients requires more than an understanding of the science of modern Western medicine. The human experience …

Everyone knows that there is very little that Western medicine can offer for the common cold and flu. And every Chinese person is similarly convinced that famous Chinese medicines like ban lan gan ke li, yin qiao jie du pian, or gan mao qing re ke li work really well for similar symptoms. As a …

I plan for this website to focus more on alternative medicines and overall wellness; this will include Chinese as well as more “Western” complementary medicines. So, let’s talk about the very popular home remedies involving urinary tract issues. Many women with bladder infections (“cystitis”, UTIs) use cranberry juice, and many men swear that saw palmetto …

Yes, we are definitely in flu season. And yes, most of it is probably H1N1. But most everyone is doing fine. I still recommend the vaccine for high risk groups that can get it, but it’s a personal decision, and I can’t even convince my wife to get it! So, let’s focus more on natural …