Duke Integrative Medicine’s state-of-the-healing-arts facility offers a balanced blend of conventional and complementary therapies.

What if medicine were more about caring for health than about treating disease? What if doctors and patients were partners in health and healing? What if a patient left her doctor’s office feeling as though her spirit had been cared for as much as her body?

These are the goals of Duke Integrative Medicine, which intends to transform the art, science, and practice of medicine.

The word integrate means to blend into a unified whole. Integrative medicine (IM) seeks to do just that: To combine the very best in conventional medicine and cutting-edge diagnosis and treatment with carefully selected, evidence-based complementary therapies. The ultimate goal is the health and healing of the whole person -- body, mind, and spirit.

“Integrative medicine emphasizes all the factors that affect health, wellness, and disease, including the psychosocial and spiritual dimensions of a person’s life,” says Evangeline Lausier, MD, director of clinical services at Duke Integrative Medicine. “It brings patients and caregivers into a partnership to achieve the patient’s optimal health and healing.”

Duke opened its new IM facility in 2007. The state-of-the-art building and idyllic landscape that Duke Integrative Medicine calls home was designed with health and healing in mind.

The first medical facility in North Carolina to receive LEED status for its environmental stewardship, it is meant to represent, in structural form, a balance between mental, spiritual, emotional, and physical health. Local Durham artchitects Duda/Paine LLC received a 2010 American Institute of Architects award for the design of the building, the only building on all of Duke's campus to receive such recognition.

Integrative medicine is gaining recognition in academic medical centers around the country. Lausier says the integrative trend in medicine is a much-needed transformation.

“When someone receives a serious diagnosis such as cancer, or has an event such as a heart attack or surgery, modern medicine is at its best. After the treatment, however, the next critical step in the process is healing, when the body and the soul become whole again. Very often, this essential phase of healing is not recognized and supported.”

Lausier and her team use Personalized Health Planning -- a process in which patients work with physicians to carefully assess their current health status and create a personal health plan.

The personalized plan incorporates conventional health practices, such as medications, preventive screenings, and diagnostic tests, with complementary therapies such as acupuncture, mind-body therapies such as hypnosis or guided imagery, nutritional therapies, and fitness and movement programs.

Duke Integrative Medicine allows patients to choose their level of involvement -- from individual classes to half-day visits to annual memberships.

Patients can access a range of services that are all available at the center: Comprehensive medical examinations, screenings, and consultations; therapeutic consultations and services such as acupuncture, mindfulness practices, or massage; health coaching sessions; and workshops and seminars on topics from diabetes to cancer to depression to weight loss. In-depth, multiple-day immersion experiences are also available to help implement a patient’s personal health plan or to assist with recovery after surgery or cancer treatment.

“We believe there is a powerful relationship between the body, mind, spirit, and community. When patients and providers work together to address the whole person, patients heal faster and more effectively reach their optimal level of health,” says Lausier.

“We want to explore new ways of strengthening today’s health-care system, and to shift the focus of medicine to a health orientation rather than a disease-based model of care.”

IM in Action

Integrative medicine recognizes that different health situations require different responses. Often these may be conventional treatments such as medications or surgical interventions.

But sometimes the best treatment may be a careful, scientifically supported but complementary therapy. These complementary therapies can be used to support or replace conventional practices. Some examples include:

• Acupuncture to reduce nausea, a common side effect of chemotherapy
• Nutritional supplements and deep breathing practices for stress reduction
• Hypnotherapy and massage to reduce anxiety about impending surgery and promote healing afterward
• Prenatal yoga to ease a woman's body through the stages of pregnancy and in preparation for labor