ABSTRACT
Western biomedicine (i.e., the medicine practiced in American hospitals) represents just one of the many medical practices and philosophies in the world today. In fact, 80% of the world’s population receives their medical care from a system outside of traditional Western biomedicine.89 These other medical systems and practices are collectively referred to as complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), sometimes called complementary and integrative medicine (CIM). CAM practices continue to increase in popularity and prevalence in traditionally Western populations; however, the safety and efcacy of many CAM practices remain undetermined, and the question of how to integrate the evaluation and discussion of CAM therapies in everyday patient care continues to challenge physicians from many specialties. This chapter (1) briey denes CAM, (2) identies which segments of the population are likely to use CAM, (3) outlines an ethical and
evidence-supported approach for sports medicine physicians to use in evaluating and using CAM therapies or in caring for or counseling with athletes, and (4) summarizes the best efcacy and safety evidence for a few of the myriad CAM therapies used by athletes today (Tables 38.1 and 38.2).
