“I love what I do,” Candace Warner says as she inserts a series of disposable needles into the skin of Mary Gremillion. “It shows,” Gremillion says, luxuriating in the ambiance of the softly lit room, where pet relaxation music floats through the air.
Warner, a doctor who became a full-time acupuncturist, says she finds certain human relaxation music a bit too Eastern in tone. Besides, she also treats dogs.
Local caregivers say when Western medicine fails to give patients the results they expect, many turn to ancient folk remedies that, despite doubts of their validity, draw eager acolytes. And older Americans are central to the growing popularity of complementary and alternative medicine.
“It’s been a trend, and the baby boomers are driving it,” says Mark Stupka, cofounder of the Center for Natural Healing. “They have seen and witnessed their parents and grandparents go through the ‘alternative’ medicine of chemicals.”
Stupka, a Washington Parish native, says patented drugs are an important part of health care and are often synchronized with alternative methods—hence the term complementary medicine—but also have drawbacks compared with natural supplements.
“Pharmaceuticals and surgery are crisis-intervention therapies,” he says. “For short-term usage, then the drugs are a blessing. If you use them long-term, you’re only going to compromise your liver and other organs such as your kidneys. Your body isn’t meant to process synthetics. It’s a living organism.”
A recently published report by the National Institutes of Health says Americans in 2007 spent almost $34 billion out of pocket on herbal remedies, acupuncture, massage therapy, hypnosis and other unconventional treatments.
That fraction of total medical spending—upwards of $2 trillion annually—still shows a big jump since the last similar survey in 1997, which said Americans spent $27 billion on yet-unproven cures.
The NIH says its 2007 data shows that people in the 50- to 69-year-old range had the highest percentage of CAM use of all age groups.
Gremillion says she sought alternative relief for her arthritis when pain meds didn’t do enough. The 74-year-old’s health insurance covers part of her acupuncture treatment because Warner has a degree, albeit in internal medicine and infectious diseases.
“I wasn’t a believer,” Gremillion says. “And I got desperate and I tried it, and I got hooked. It makes the endorphins flow, which relaxes the muscles. For people like me, it’s a godsend.”
Warner says her practice is rewarding to her in light of her former incarnation treating AIDS patients and visiting prisoners to administer care.
“The people I have come to me are usually very happy,” she says. “They want to come. With infection diseases … it’s kind of a downer. This is very gratifying.”
