World Health Organization
The World HealthOrganization (WHO) defines health as “a state of complete physical, mental andsocial wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”1. Integrative medicine seeks to restore and maintain health and wellness across a person’s lifespan by understanding the patient’s unique set of circumstances and addressing the full range of physical, emotional, mental, social, spiritualand environmental influences that affect health.2. Through personalizing care,integrative medicine goes beyond the treatment of symptoms to address allhe causes of an illness. In doing so, the patient’s immediate health needs as well as the effects of the long-term and complex interplay between biological, behavioral, psychosocial and environmental influences are taken into account.3. Integrative medicine is not the same as alternative medicine, which refers to an approach to healing that is utilized in place of conventional therapies, or complementary medicine, which refers to healing modalities that are used to complement allopathic approaches. If the defining principles are applied, care can be integrative regardless of which modalities are utilized.