Naturopathic Physical Medicine

Book excerpt: NATUROPATHIC PHYSICAL MEDICINE provides a philosophical naturopathic perspective, as well as practical clinical applications, for manual and physical approaches to health care. A wide range of bodywork and movement approaches and modalities are evaluated in relation to their ability to be appropriately used in naturopathic treatment and rehabilitation settings. The model of care emphasised in this text recognizes that naturopathically oriented therapeutic interventions usually focus on achieving one or all of the following: enhancement of function so that the person, system or part, can better self-regulate in response to adaptive demands; modification or removal of adaptive load factors; and symptomatic relief without creation of significant additional adaptive changes.