Spiritual and nontraditional medicine gaining ground
BY STEVEN MAYER, Californian staff writer
smayer@bakersfield.com | Saturday, Oct 02 2010 12:00 PM
Felix Adamo / The Californian
Mary Stevenson is at one of her Reiki sessions with Dr. Naina Patel at the Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center. Stevenson, who was diagnosed with colon cancer two years ago, underwent traditional treatment but is now also going with Eastern treatments.
Felix Adamo / The Californian
After her Reiki session with Dr. Naina Patel, right, Mary Stevenson is greeted by Dr. Ravi Patel at the Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center. Stevenson was diagnosed with colon cancer two years ago and underwent traditional treatment but is now also going with Eastern treatments.
Felix Adamo / The Californian
In a darkened office at the Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center, Mary Stevenson waits for her Reiki session with Dr. Naina Patel to begin.
Felix Adamo / The Californian
Dr. Naina Patel is using eastern medicine as part of Mary Stevenson''''''''''''''''s treatment for cancer.
Henry A. Barrios / The Californian
Larry Costner leads a class in tai chi at Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center. Some of the students are cancer patients who learn tai chi to help reduce stress.
Henry A. Barrios / The Californian
Barbara Newkirk is a breast cancer patient who is currently going through chemotherapy. She breaks into a smile as she learns tai chi at a class at Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center.
Henry A. Barrios / The Californian
Tom Darnell participates in a tai chi class at C.B.C.C. in Bakersfield. His wife is a breast cancer survivor.
A single candle flickered nearby as cancer survivor Mary Stevenson lay back, closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
Standing over her, Dr. Naina Patel, of Comprehensive Blood & Cancer Center in Bakersfield, placed both hands over Stevenson''''''''''''''''s brow, an area of the body known in Hindu and Buddhist cultures as the third eye or the sixth chakra.
"You can feel it, the heat. It''''''''''''''''s really quite amazing," Stevenson said of the Reiki, or touch therapy treatments she''''''''''''''''s been receiving at the center at no cost.
The Kernville resident placed her faith in modern medicine after she was diagnosed two years ago with colon cancer. So much so that she agreed to undergo surgery and chemotherapy just weeks after hearing the frightening news from her doctor.
But Stevenson, now 75, has also walked an Eastern path, engaging in Yoga, meditation and other ancient healing and relaxation practices in her search for health and happiness.
To treat only her physical self, Stevenson said, would be a half-measure, an incomplete effort.
"I realized there is more than that," she said. "The mind, body and spirit are all integrated. One influences the other."
Thirty years ago, such talk might have elicited giggles or even angry denunciations in the conservative corridors of American health care. But today, non-traditional "integrative medicine" is being embraced by a growing number of care centers, universities and medical schools as a way to treat the whole patient -- not just the disease -- and deliver the best possible outcome.
Integrative care recognizes the spiritual nature of the individual, said Dr. Naina Patel, whom patients refer to as "Dr. Naina" to differentiate her from her husband, Dr. Ravi Patel, the director of CBCC.
"It won''''''''''''''''t appeal to everybody, and that''''''''''''''''s OK," Dr. Naina said of the holistic approach.
But integrative care is no longer on the fringes, she added. "It is becoming mainstream."
Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York has had an Integrative Medicine division since 1999. Cornell University, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, the University of Arizona, Duke University and several other prestigious institutions have developed programs around integrative medicine.
Complimentary, not alternative
At Bakersfield''''''''''''''''s sprawling CBCC, multimillion dollar equipment fills entire rooms: MRIs, CT scans, radiation therapy, chemo, cyber knife treatments -- these and other services at the center reflect a determination to offer the latest technologies and techniques to diagnose and treat life-threatening cancers and related diseases.
The center''''''''''''''''s amazing CT/PET imaging technology reveals cancerous tumors on computer screens as if they were glowing embers.
But weaved into the tapestry of the center is a philosophy that explicitly acknowledges the value of offering spiritual and mind medicine to supplement and support the conventional treatment of the physical body.
A meditation room just off the main lobby offers a place for quiet solitude and reflection.
"We''''''''''''''''ve actually taught meditation to a lot of our employees who have expressed an interest," said Dr. Ravi Patel.
Pastel colors, soothing murals and fish aquariums can be found throughout the center.
Near the heart of the building, a universal or interfaith chapel displays the symbols of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism.
"Prayer," Patel said, "is an important part of healing for many of our patients. Just as we have a meditation group, every Thursday we also offer a Bible study group."
Yoga and tai chi classes are also offered along with guest lectures on biofeedback, dance therapy, acupuncture and more.
"The diagnosis of cancer is not a story of defeat and discouragemen