East Meets West for PTSD Treatment

Anxiety Insights gives us a look at an interesting challenge faced at Boston Medical Center, where they needed to treat a large number of refugees monks from Tibet who were suffering from PTSD caused by the ongoing religious persecution there.

Doctors realized that there were significant differences in the approaches taken by eastern and western cultures, especially in how they viewed medicine, so the Boston Center for Refugee Health and Human Rights developed an innovative treatment program that leveraged and integrated both approaches.

Of particular interest was the participatory aspect of the treatment regimen, where the monks were able to actively engage in their treatment, rather than the typical structured approach, where the patient simply follows along where the therapist leads. This helped to ensure that any therapy involved did not conflict with religious or spiritual beliefs, which provided for a much smoother and hopefully more effective outcome.

Having used Buddhist learning and practice to compliment my own therapy, I can affirm that combining traditional and non-traditional techniques can certainly benefit the patient, and my own experience of integrating eastern and western methods leads me to be an enthusiastic supporter of this approach.

East meets west: Integrating cross-cultural treatments for PTSD

Stand by Me

Via YouTube, a collection of unknown street musicians from around the world contributing to a touching rendition of Stand by Me.