A Prescription To Reduce Our Prescriptions | On Point – WBUR – WBUR

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With guest host Jane Clayson.

Alternative medicine expert Dr. Andrew Weil says we take too much medication, and its hurting us more than we know. He says there are better options.

Americans take more medication than ever before. Pills for just about everything. Sleep, headaches, the common cold. Dr. Andrew Weil, says there are plenty of other safer and more effective options to cure what ails you. For decades, hes been spreading the word with books, lectures. He's a media sensation. Hes also controversial. This hour On Point, a big rethink with Dr. Andrew Weil.

Dr. Andrew Weil, integrative medicine pioneer and author. Director of the University of Arizona's Center for Integrative Medicine, where he is also a professor of medicine, public health and integrative rheumatology. His newest book is "Mind Over Meds:Know When Drugs Are Necessary, When Alternatives Are Better and When to Let Your Body Heal on Its Own." Also author of "The Natural Mind" and "Spontaneous Healing," among many others. (@DrWeil)

Dr. Pieter Cohen, general internist at the Cambridge Health Alliance in Somerville, MA. Assistant professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School. Co-founder of Updates in Slow Medicine.

New York Times: How Many Pills Are Too Many? "The idea of dropping unnecessary medications started cropping up in the medical literature a decade ago. In recent years, evidence has mounted about the dangers of taking multiple, perhaps unnecessary, medications."

Parade: Sunday With: Dr. Andrew Weil "Dr.Andrew Weil encountered his fair share of skepticism when he opened his Center for Integrative Medicine in 1994 to help bridge the gap between conventional evidence-based medicine and alternative therapies. Now, as Americans are increasingly interested in taking a 360-approach to their health, products bearing Weils name, from a skincare line to comfort shoes, fly off the shelves."

STAT News:Medicine with a side of mysticism: Top hospitals promote unproven therapies "Theyre among the nations premier medical centers, at the leading edge of scientific research. Yet hospitals affiliated with Yale, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and other top medical research centers also aggressively promote alternative therapies with little or no scientific backing. They offer 'energy healing' to help treat multiple sclerosis, acupuncture for infertility, and homeopathic bee venom for fibromyalgia. A public forum hosted by the University of Floridas hospital even promises to explain how herbal therapy can reverse Alzheimers. (It cant.)"

This program aired on May 3, 2017.

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A Prescription To Reduce Our Prescriptions | On Point - WBUR - WBUR