Integrative Medicine Consult Service
Established at the NIH Clinical Center

The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) has established an Integrative Medicine Consult Service at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical Center, the world’s largest hospital devoted to research.

The Clinical Center’s Pain and Palliative Care Service and the Rehabilitation Medicine Department have offered massage, acupuncture, Reiki, hypnosis, guided imagery, acupuncture, tai chi and qi gong training prior to the implementation of the consulting service, and the center’s pharmacy department has been consulting on herbals and herb-drug interactions and conducted research in these areas.

The Integrative Medicine Consult Service will coordinate the resources of these existing services to meet the needs of the Clinical Center staff and its patients, according to an NCCAM press release. In addition to offering clinical consultation regarding CAM therapies, the service will establish a research program embedded in NIH’s clinical and translational research structure, as well as provide CAM education for NIH staff, patients and their families.

This service will provide physicians, nurses and other members of the Clinical Center health-care team the ability to discuss complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) therapies with knowledgeable medical staff from the consult service and learn how various CAM practices might complement or interact with a patient’s care as a research participant at the Clinical Center.

“Volunteers who participate in clinical research at the NIH Clinical Center are partners in medical discovery. We are committed to providing excellent care for them,” said John I. Gallin, M.D., director of the Clinical Center. “This new consult service will help enhance the care they receive and the research conducted here.”

The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine’s mission is to explore complementary and alternative medical practices in the context of rigorous science, train CAM researchers and disseminate authoritative information to the public and to professionals. For additional information, call NCCAM’s Clearinghouse toll free at (888) 644-6226 or visit nccam.nih.gov.