When All You Have is a Hammer...

Using surgery and pharmaceutical drugs, tools best suited to address medical emergencies, as a means to produce a healthy society is a misguided approach. It is like someone trying to grow a garden in their backyard using only two tools - a pair of shears and some insecticide. Obviously the complexities of growing a garden necessitate the use and consideration of many things like proper sunlight, water, soil chemistry, nutrients and fertilizers, etc. If our neighbor claimed only two-tools could yield a healthy garden, would we take that person seriously?

Now consider that the human body is like a very, very complex garden, replete with varieties of micro-organisms which all seek harmony and homeostasis. The body needs a wide array of support from nutrition to emotional well-being. It makes no sense to limit the care of the human being to two tools - drugs and surgery. All too often we become biased by the tools on our belt. Remember, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail!

The consequence of the narrow approach, of using emergency intervention in the majority of cases, is a misdiagnoses of the needs of patients. Patients may needed emergency care and medical crisis management at certain points. Yet what is need by the patient, and lacking in the medical model, is a holistic, patient-centered approach. The missing diagnosis in the surgery/drug model is the realization that the patient is a whole person, with all the qualities and complexities inherent in an individual. Patients are people with symptoms, not symptoms with people attached.