holistic medicine

"Holistic." How often do we hear that word bandied about by practitioners of "complementary and alternative medicine" (CAM) or, as it's increasingly called, "integrative medicine" (IM)? Lots. The reason is that CAM/IM practitioners seem to think they own the word. They've so utterly co-opted it that it has become meaningless, in the process perverting it. No longer does it mean "taking care of the whole person." Not really, at least not anymore. Thanks to quacks having taken possession of it as their own, "holistic" now has a connotation of woo, in which it is said to be impossible to be a…