mental health

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TMA 03

Discuss what complementary and alternative therapies have to offer mental health service users/survivors.

This essay will begin by looking at the meaning of complementary and alternative therapies; as the name suggests, complementary therapies usually complement or work alongside mainstream medicine while alternative therapies offer treatments that can replace orthodox medical treatment altogether.

Complementary and alternative therapies which are often abbreviated to CAMs include approaches to health that are based on traditional healing methods from non-western cultures. Another definition of complementary and alternative approaches is that they are:

"a broad domain of healing resources that encompass all health systems, modalities, and practices and their accompanying theories and beliefs, other than those intrinsic to the politically dominant health systems of a particular society or culture in a given historical period"{the Cochrane collaboration, quoted in house of lords,2000,para. 1.12}.

The use of CAMs are becoming increasingly popular in the UK. This could be as a result of people trying and finding the CAM methods very effective; another way to try and understand the change is to see it as a reaction against orthodox medicine.

Surveys carried out showed that in recent times, people