A Meeting for the Future of Botanical Medicine

In an article in the New York Times called “At Bronx Botanical Garden, Mainstream Doctors Meet Kava and Cohosh,” Leslie Berger writes about a conference called “Botanical Medicine in Modern Clinical Practice” in June 2003. Doctors who came to this conference were worried about the future of botanical medicine. One Dr. Small came into the weeklong conference because he was startled about the results of recent studies of hormone replacement therapy, called the Women’s Health Initiative. The study revealed that the women who were on the hormone replacement therapy had increased risks of diseases that the treatment was supposed to protect them from – diseases including cardiovascular disease and dementia. Dr. Small stated:

As a group, we've been confronted with the surprising results of the Women's
Health Initiative -- startling is even a better word -- and I think it's
incumbent upon us to find other helpful avenues for our patients

However, there are some optimists for the field of botanical medicine. One of these people were Dr. Colanaste, who claims that her patients were using many dietary supplements and folk remedies that she is eager to learn more about. Robert McCaleb, the president of the Herb Research Foundation says:

The medicinal properties of soy, saw palmetto and chocolate shared equal billing
with how to review randomized controlled trials and judge information on the
Internet.

Nevertheless, this meeting sparked more and more studies on botanical medicine. It also revealed that botanical medicine is spiraling down as alternative medicine, unless something is done about it.