Legal Issues In Integrative Medicine
Legal Issues in Integrative Medicine: A Guide for Clinicians, Hosptials, and Patients by Michael H. Cohen (National Acupuncture Foundation, 2005) is a book that empowers decisions concerning the services health care professionals or care institutions either recommend or provide to patients, or patients choose for themselves. CAM therapies are increasingly offered in conventional medical settings or clinics. This book guides those seeking to understand the legal context in which they offer or refer for health care services involving CAM, or use such therapies. Order
“This book provides a wonderful overview for physicians and administrators. Cohen makes complex legal issues involving complementary therapies easy to read and absorb.” Alan Dumoff, JD (blurb for original edition, Legal Issues in Alternative Medicine)
From the Foreword by Sherman L. Cohn, JD
This book presents a road map of issues and approaches. It raises questions and points to the answers where answers exist. In that sense, it is a primer. In a new field, a primer is needed. This truly is a new field—not only of healthcare, but also of law and legal practice. As more and more alternative healthcare offices open, as there is more and more integration, clients—practitioners, administrators, and patients — approach their attorneys for guidance. But, as very few law schools even introduce the subject (as of this writing, this author knows of only three: Georgetown, Syracuse, and Seton Hall, with one now proposed at Houston), and established health law organizations (e.g., the American Bar Association's Health Law Section) have not yet begun to offer continuing education courses in this field, very few lawyers have the background to deal with these issues. This book will help those lawyers. And, it will help clients educate their lawyers on the issues they face.
As we see the world of healthcare evolving, we see alternative care increasingly in the picture. To a great extent, the movement is led by those consumers who are demanding more and are not willing to accept the paternalistic answers of old. But, it is the practitioner, the administrator, the clinic, the hospital, and their lawyers, who must struggle with the legal issues. This book is a place to start.
