Money or life?

“MONEY or life?”

This writer bets we all have seen a movie where a robber asks a robbed one that question at gunpoint. The wrong answer could cost the latter’s life.

So it goes with the doctor-patient relationship. Imagine a patient not following doctor’s order.  He could save money but lose his life. But he would be luckier to save both. May I cite a personal experience?

There was a time when a doctor asked me to take an anti-cholesterol drug after an x-ray had revealed an “atherosclerotic aorta.” Because the branded “statin drug” was very expensive and I was already spending much for anti-hypertension “maintenance,” I sought for a way to save both money and life.

The search led me to an internet website stating statistics on “statin” – medical term for an anti-cholesterol drug. It shocked me to read about users of the drug complaining of a similar side effect: excruciating muscular pains. So why should I even try?

Next, I went to a bookstore and bought the book Stop Inflammation Now by Dr. Richard Fleming.

Dr. Fleming suggested fruits and vegetables as the better alternatives to anti-cholesterol drugs in restoring cardio-vascular health. As much as possible, he said, “Avoid pork, beef and other red meat.”

How could I disagree? No less than the acknowledged Greek father of medicine, Hippocrates (460-337 BC), taught, “Let your food be your medicine.”

Today, we all know that vegetables and fruits strengthen the body’s built-in immune system, giving it the capacity to fight disease-causing bacteria and virus. The lowly and cheap malunggay has already been proven effective in boosting the immune system.

There were no “fast foods” and preserved “junks” in his time. No doubt his foodstuffs consisted of fresh plants and fish. Hippocrates lived to be an octogenarian.

Hippocrates as a physician – so I discovered during my research – applied what is now known as “nutritional therapy.”

He might have heard of herbal practitioners who had preceded him. Despite the primitive means of transportation and communication in his time, alternative medicine as practiced in China for centuries had already gained global patronage. Today, such previously doubtful Chinese practices as acupuncture, acupressure and reflexology have gained a niche in modern medicine.

Shed of hypocrisy, conventional medicine ought to be integrated with alternative medicine because they complement each other like parallel railroad tracks.

Take for instance the supposedly newly-discovered therapeutic “isoflavones” in soybeans and “carotenoids” in certain fruits and vegetables that had served our ancestors well.

Natural medicines are no cure-all but are not detrimental unless laced with chemicals. They offer hope to desperate patients, including those whom hospitals have given up.

There was a time when representatives of a Japanese drug company came to Manila looking for suppliers of rosas sa baybayon, allegedly to verify and validate its anti-cancer reputation.

In the United States, according to by Dr. Allan Magaziner – author of the book Living Longer and Healthier – half of the population are already hooked to alternative health programs that claim to “add years to life and life to years.”

Unfortunately, on the other hand, the Philippine government has shown little interest in implementing the Traditional Alternative Medicine Act (TAMA) of 1998, which encourages drug manufacturers to use medicinal plants approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as components of their products. Among  them are lagundi for cough and asthma; ampalaya, diabetes; sambong, urinary stones; yerba buena, body aches; and garlic, hypertension.

Sometimes I wonder whether FDA’s passivity on its obligation to promote the aforesaid plant cures is proof its officials’ “golden fidelity” to the Big Pharma. (hvego31@yahoo.com/PN)