Integration possible

(With the development of traditional Chinese medicine, some western trained doctors have begun to use TCM techniques in their routine treatments. And some of them are coming to China to learn more. Among them are Amin Balloue and Echurhurd Nobache. Both doctors from Germany, they’re now studying at the China Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Beijing. I asked them why they came all the way here to learn something so very different from conventional western medicine. )

Echurhurd (E for short): I think in Germany, the general development in medicine is to see not only symptoms and to treat symptoms and patients, but also to see the whole person, what they’re suffering about. So with the TCM medicine, we think we treat them in an advanced manner and can do more for our patients .The last two years, I managed to treat them with acupuncture, I found that a lot of good effects, so I came a second time to china to get more and more information about acupuncture.

H: Amin, have you treated your patient with TCM methods before like acupuncture or what?

Amin (A for short): I learned it in the Arab countries but it was not the same, but we usually make the acupuncture in the points, and I get very good results.

H: So I wonder when did you first get fimiliar with traditional Chinese medicine, how did you come to know about it?

E: I often noticed that the patients visited other doctors and had acuponcture there and I asked them about the effect and most of them said it had some effect and the last two years, I trained the acupuncture and I treated 10 to 20 patients a day with acuponcture and the effect was wonderful.

H: So some of the patients use alternative methods like TCM or acupuncture. As their doctor, don't you feel upset about your patients' using another method, but instead you would like to know more about this method?

E;I think so The TCM is well-known in Germany and a lot of schools are giving lessons for training acupuncture in Germany, but what I want to do say is just to go to the Mecca and to hear it from the folk who know about the tradition more than our doctors can know.

H: But, I wonder what does your German colleagues and the other western trained doctors think of the traditional Chinese medicine?

E: I think it's strange for them at first. And after I was here two years ago, I went to visit the doctor. They meet each other once a month, and I showed them the film I made about the clinic in China and told them what we can do here. They got the big ears, you know, and two of them asked me already to come here to mange it like that. I think it is a growing the branch of treatment.

H: What do you find is the most interesting part here?

E: One thing is important for me that we are able to work in the clinic what we cannot do in Germany. In Germany we have lessons to study points and points and points and here we can went to clinic and treat the patients and ask is it better. And I think in 8 of 10 cases after 3 or 4 treatments, it is getting better,So we can be very sure about TCM if we not only know the points but also know the reason.

H: So, These kinds of first-hand information you cannot get in Germany. But some say that traditional Chinese medicine lacks the scientific base and proof for their treatment. I know that you are also learning traditional Chinese medicine theory here. So what do you find in this process? Do you think this kind of theory is useful for you?

E: I think it's useful because I try to think in this way when I learned about TCM. And I think one day we will find the link. The TCM must not be lack of scientific medicine, and vise versa.

A: It is not only different medicine but it is also a kind of different thinking, because we western doctors if I am a cardiologist, I only think of heart. But in TCM we have the relation between heart and lung and they adhere very well. I think it's a very good basing and starting for us.

H: What do you plan to do after you come back to Germany?

A: I want to start it as soon as possible, because my patients are waiting for new information and for new medicine.

H: Echurhurd, What do you plan after you come back, I mean about treating your patient with the TCM. Do you have any specific plan?

E: Yes, I have a big office and I see a lot of patients maybe a hundred patients probably. A part I do treat with acupuncture and I have other possibilities as well .But this what I try to say: before we shall find a whole view about medicine and treatment in our patients, one part should be TCM. It must not be scientific thinking, that can not be scientific thinking, that has to be the thinking like TCM things. I try to think in this way. Only in this way I can understand it. If I try to think in a scientific way and try to understand TCM, there's no chance. So I have two ways of thinking about them.

H: It's interesting that you two are telling me that you are treating the patients using both the the western methods and TCM methods. Do you think these two kinds of completely different systems can be integrated together to some extend?

E: Not in the way of thinking only in one way, and in this one way, both things are together. They will be a part every time. But one person can think in two ways. Mostly maybe you find TCM and scientific doctors divorce like that, but more and more I see doctors who can think in both ways. I hope they think so. I try to do it.