Lewis Mehl-Madrona: Chronic Pain and Opiates I describe my struggle with prescribing opiates for people in chronic pain. My observation has been that my patients on opiates don't seem to be in any less pain than my patients not on opiates, and sometimes they are more grumpy. I explore the literature and learn that prolonged opiate use sensitizes people to feel more pain and that it can also act as a neurotoxin producing neuropathic-like pain, so perhaps not a good idea

Lewis Mehl-Madrona: The Debate Over Obamacare I offer my views on health care financing. I suggest that we have reached a point as a society in which we are not willing to let people die in hospital waiting rooms who do not have insurance. We even have laws that require hospitals to care for whoever appears regardless of ability to pay even if we do not have any means to remunerate those hospitals. It's time to wake up to the reality that this kind of reality costs.

Dr. Kathleen Albertson, L. Ac., PhD: Amenorrhea: What does not having a menstrual cycle mean? Amenorrhea means "no menstrual flow" (absence of menstruation). In Chinese medicine, it refers to "no moon." Today it is more important than ever to understand TCM (Traditional Chinese medicine which includes acupuncture and herbal medicine) as well as Western medicine. Today's reality integrates these two schools of thought to improve patient care. TCM gets to the root cause naturally with out the harsh affects of drugs.