Alternative medicine is defined as "any of various systems of healing or treating disease not included in the traditional medical curricula taught in the United States and Britain". Comprehending the powerful contribution to health and illness of a person's behaviors, psychosocial concerns, and physical environment, and delineating what positive effects complementary therapies contribute to these elements, are critical goals that can help to shape the direction of healthcare reform.
The field of complementary and alternative medicine, originally defined as therapies and practices not taught in U.S. medical schools or available to U.S. hospitals, is evolving into the field of integrative medicine 7 or complementary and integrative health.



Alternative medicine has been defined by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) as a form of healing practice which is "used in place of conventional medicine, such as using a special diet to treat cancer instead of undergoing surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy that has been recommended by a conventional doctor." It is different from complementary medicine, which is a healing practice being used together with standard medical care, e.g. using acupuncture to help with side effects of cancer treatment; or, integrative medicine, which "is a total approach to care that involves the patient's mind, body, and spirit and combines standard medical treatments with CAM practices that have shown the most promise".
This movement is well on its way in Canada: the Association of Complementary and Integrative Physicians of British Columbia and similar provincial organizations, as well as the Canadian Complementary Medical Association, offer an education- and action-based forum for medical doctors interested in learning more and in practising and promoting these other healing modalities; the Canadian Interdisciplinary Network for Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research is an interdisciplinary, collaborative research network created to foster excellence in CAM research; and the Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Undergraduate Medical Education curriculum project is working with all 17 Canadian medical schools to organize an appropriate curriculum in CAM.

The NIH National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (formerly called the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine) is the federal government's lead agency for scientific research on medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not generally considered part of conventional medicine.
Using synthetic drugs and surgery to treat health conditions was known just a few decades ago as, simply, medicine.” Today, this system is increasingly being termed conventional medicine.” This is the kind of medicine most Americans still encounter in hospitals and clinics.
Evidence is what makes the big difference between the complementary treatments that are considered part of complementary alternative medicine and all the other complementary and alternative treatments out there (you may hear your doctor lump them together into one term: CAM).

Therefore, clinically, these interventions seem to be included in the offerings of integrative centers as adjunctive therapies when resources are available, based on a philosophy of garnish”—an added service that is not imperative but nice to offer because patients like them and they appear to present little risk.
This 3-hour workshop, led by a diverse panel of integrative medicine faculty, will incorporate didactic presentations, engaging experiential activities, and interactive discussions to help trainees develop successful integrative medicine careers by learning skills for self-care, identifying and working with mentors, and goal-setting.

In addition to symptomatic clues and obviously a physical exam, if appropriate, functional medicine practitioners are also looking in-depth at a person's unique health history to find more clues as to how and why the body is not functioning as it should.
While this may be because these patients avoid effective treatment, some alternative therapies are actively harmful (e.g. cyanide poisoning from amygdalin , or the intentional ingestion of hydrogen peroxide ) or actively interfere with effective treatments.

Any therapy that is typically excluded by conventional medicine, and that patients use instead of conventional medicine, is known as alternative medicine.” It's a catch-all term that includes hundreds of old and new practices ranging from acupuncture to homeopathy to iridology.