In Complementary and Integrative Medicine, How Can We Design Research Studies So They're Most Useful?

On November 9, 2009, the Institute for Integrative Health partnered with the Baltimore-based Center for Medical Technology Policy (CMTP) to convene a Stakeholder Symposium on the Evidentiary Framework for Complementary and Integrative Medicine (CIM). This meeting grew directly out of the February 2009 Summit on Integrative Medicine and the Health of the Public, sponsored by the Institute of Medicine and the Bravewell Collaborative. The February conference highlighted a compelling need for more – and more useful – research in the field of integrative care. Now focusing on the hot-button issue of comparative effectiveness research, the Institute and CMTP brought together 45 diverse experts and stakeholders to examine opportunities and obstacles in carrying out rigorous, clinically useful integrative medicine studies.

A concluding round-table discussion is posted online and welcomes public comment. The Institute is using its new media initiative SpeakHealth to spark broad discussion and search for consensus among many stakeholders – CIM and conventional researchers and clinicians, patients, third-party payers and government health agencies. During 2010, a follow-up working group will draft guidelines for the design of effective CIM research.

You're invited to comment online and check back for reports on progress.

New Media Initiative, SpeakHealth, Launched Online: See. Talk. Change.

A novel collaboration of three organizations was launched online, October 15, 2009. Brainchild of the Institute for Integrative Health, the Imaging Research Center of the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and InfoCulture, this rare initiative aims to instigate talk and change over a refreshingly wide span of health issues, and do so by exploring interactive new media – online videos, street interviews and surveys, blogs and comments, conversations and social networks.

Early, divergent posts include a short on the way we eat now, quirky samplings of the week's health news, a matriarch's reflections on teaching health, a filmmaker's view of science, art, medicine and uncertainty, a video round-table on integrative medicine research, and thoughts on the evidence base for 'Dancing With the Stars.'

Add your take on these and other topics in the neighborhood of health. The idea is that together we are better at engaging creative action, weaving new knowledge – from research, practice and conversation – into culture.

See. Talk. Change.