Integrative Medicine Commons^™

Theoria, Sanjay Rau, Ryan Kollar

Akesis

I heal through meditation.

Upon turning 13 years old, I began the practice of meditation under the tutelage of Hindu priests in Chennai, India. The expectation of this experience was to learn to clear out all distractions, focus intently on breathing and recite certain passages of Scripture.

At the time, meditation involved sitting cross-legged and reciting certain phrases 1008 times. The hot, muggy weather and mosquitos that plagued summers in Chennai made this task even harder. While difficult and seemingly purposeless at first, I began to appreciate and better understand the power that meditative practices provided in the following summer …

Standstill, Ianna Hondros-Mccarthy

Akesis

This is a short story about a girl getting in touch with life at a concert.

I Lost You To What Eludes Me, Akesis Anonymous Author

Akesis

I wrote this in memory of someone I lost in my life to cancer. My own healing process is still ongoing, and his loss was one major reason I decided to go into medicine. Hopefully through my journey in medicine I can help heal others, and in the process, find my own healing.

Helpless In Healing, Stephanie Braunthal

Akesis

Inspired by a frustrating patient interaction, this piece delves into the the role of the physician-patient relationship throughout the healing process.

From Falx To Fingertips: An Exercise In Mind-Body Awareness Through Acupuncture, Aye Mon Win

Akesis

This is a subjective account of an acupuncture treatment that includes a brief scientific exploration of its mechanisms of action. Additionally, connections are made between acupuncture and osteopathic manual manipulation, yoga, and meditation.

Flow, Jenifer Van Deusen

Akesis

Within us and around us flows the power to heal ~ open through song, image, poetry & breath.

Bones, Polyxeni Gudis

Akesis

I heal in the absence of words with the quiet scratching of charcoal on paper, and with the familiar texture of my thumb blending and erasing shadows with dust. I push my boundaries with new mediums, like watercolors. I experiment often and usually fail. I put my anger into harsh lines, I choose colors based on an emotion and I fill a canvas with the things I cannot say. I heal in brush strokes and in the contours of a piece that says what I want it to say without having to ever say a word.

Medium: Charcoal and pen …

Essentials Of Herb-Drug Interactions In The Elderly With Cardiovascular Disease, Sulaiman Sultan, Maria Viqar, Rabaiya Ali, A. Jamil Tajik, Arshad Jahangir

Arshad Jahangir, MD

As the number of individuals, particularly the elderly, using herbal products with prescription drugs continues to grow, the risk for adverse interactions increases but remains poorly recognized. The true incidence and nature of adverse herb reactions or herb-drug interactions remains unknown since no postmarketing surveillance mechanism exists. Adverse events are greatly underreported, and information regarding safety mainly comes from case reports and suboptimally conducted studies in a limited number of healthy young volunteers or patients with limited comorbidities. Therefore, convincing evidence for the safety of herbal products in the elderly is lacking, and the true magnitude of problems that herb-drug …

Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth: A Case-Based Review, Kristen H. Reynolds

Kristen Reynolds, MD

Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) is a condition of increased microbial load in the small intestine. The microbes feed on dietary carbohydrates and starches via fermentation, leading to gas production, inflammation and damage to the lining of the small intestine. Clinical presentation is varied, including abdominal pain, bloating, malabsorption and systemic symptoms. SIBO is associated with many challenging and chronic conditions such as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue and chronic pain syndromes, and has been shown to be a causative factor in two out of three cases of irritable bowel syndrome. Symptoms improve with antimicrobial treatment, but recurrence is common. Many providers …

The Effects Of A Trauma-Informed Care Training Program On Mental Health Professionals Knowledge, Skills, And Attitudes With The Smi, Angelina Pelletier

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

Trauma has been found to be highly prevalent among individuals diagnosed with SMIs. Mental health professionals have been reported to misdiagnose or avoid addressing trauma in this population. There is a need to provide information about trauma and to foster awareness among mental health professionals who are treating individuals diagnosed with SMIs. With a TIC approach, operating from a recovery-oriented philosophy, there have been interventions created to address trauma and SMIs with the aim of developing awareness about trauma and the impact it may have on someone’s life. With these factors in mind, mental health professionals should be competent in …

Modulation Of Body Weight By Intestinal Flora In Orphan Nuclear Receptor Shp-/- Mice, Ryan Mifflin

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The whole-body deletion of small heterodimer partner (SHP) in mice is associated with protection from diet-induced obesity and hepatic steatosis upon feeding of a western diet. This protection was reported to be mediated through decreases in hepatic gene expression for lipogenesis, as well as increases in gene expression for fatty acid oxidation. SHP has been known to regulate the expression of the CYP7A1 gene, encoding the rate-limiting enzyme for bile acid synthesis, thereby altering the bile acid pool. The effects of this altered bile acid profile on the gut microbiome are unknown, as some bacteria in the gut are responsible …

Written On By Experience, Akesis Anonymous Author

Akesis

This poem is about a conversation I had with a friend about beginnings, and how any given experience has no intrinsic good or bad qualities, but rather holds whatever we imbibe it with.

What Is My Beginning?, Stephanie Braunthal

Akesis

I find that when we ask about beginnings, we are really asking about the present. How did a person come to be who he or she is today? As I try to answer this question about myself, I am finding it easier to express myself in diagrams (pen on scratch paper) than in words. Perhaps this is a product of being a medical student; or perhaps it is because beginnings are a complex amalgam of static forces and fluid experiences that cannot be expressed linearly through prose...Enjoy!

To Care Is To Treat, Himanshu Malhotra

Akesis

To Care is to Treat is a reflection of a few experiences from my second and third year that have inspired me to become a palliative care physician.

The Narrative Of My Childhood, Nihit N. Mehta

Akesis

I was a weak child from early on, never able to run or play as much as the other kids in my block. Each month I'd visit doctors, trying my best to recover from common colds and coughs. Luckily, all this changed as I matured and in a way I almost began living a "normal life".

However, when it came to deciding what I wanted to be as an adult, I remembered the sick kid I was and how my doctors were always there for me, helping me "find health." This made me realize that I too, could someday be …

The Descent Down The Step One Rabbit Hole, Katelyn A. Hanson

Akesis

At the start of my second year of medical school I was ecstatic to move away from the study of the normal, healthy human body and to begin to immerse myself in the complex mechanisms behind the pathophysiology of disease. I drew this illustration to connect aspects of my personality with the aspects of medicine I was most excited about exploring deeper. This image was drawn with permanent markers on the cover of a binder dedicated solely to preparing for the first part of the medical licensing exam; I looked at this drawing every day as I drove myself closer …

Laurie's Greenhouse, Elizabeth G. Mcandrew, Kelsey Albert

Akesis

Pottery by: Elizabeth McAndrew

Photography by: Kelsey Albert and Elizabeth McAndrew

Modeling: Laurie the Bird

Materials: Wheel thrown pottery - Cone 10 white clay and dipped glaze (cobalt blue and mossy green). Philodendron Heartleaf Plant. Laurie is a parrotlet, which is the second smallest species of parrot. Photo editing was done directly on the iPhone photo application.

This photo represents beginnings because it includes many elements of my life that I drew toward me in the year that I began my medical career. Living alone for the first time, I bought plants so that I wasn't the only living thing …

Beginnings, Nehal J. Shah

Akesis

The beginning of one thing signifies the end of another – for one to start, another must end. With that said, under karmic and Hindu belief, we are constantly in a cycle of beginnings, and endings, until we achieve “moksha” – true oneness with God. Furthermore, within each cycle, there are four stages of life that one hopes to go through, carrying out the ideal goals and progress of each existence. Therefore, this life ultimately is a new beginning to an old soul – a soul that has traveled and journeyed upon eons of time to find happiness, spirituality, completeness …

Beginnings: A Letter From The Editors, Akesis Editors

Akesis

The editors would like to welcome you to the inaugural issue of Akesis.

Essentials Of Herb-Drug Interactions In The Elderly With Cardiovascular Disease, Sulaiman Sultan, Maria Viqar, Rabaiya Ali, A. Jamil Tajik, Arshad Jahangir

Journal of Patient-Centered Research and Reviews

As the number of individuals, particularly the elderly, using herbal products with prescription drugs continues to grow, the risk for adverse interactions increases but remains poorly recognized. The true incidence and nature of adverse herb reactions or herb-drug interactions remains unknown since no postmarketing surveillance mechanism exists. Adverse events are greatly underreported, and information regarding safety mainly comes from case reports and suboptimally conducted studies in a limited number of healthy young volunteers or patients with limited comorbidities. Therefore, convincing evidence for the safety of herbal products in the elderly is lacking, and the true magnitude of problems that herb-drug …