The History Of Holism

ASSESSMENT 2 History and Philosophy.

Holism

Holism has an ancient and complex history, that overlaps with the history of medicine. There are many aspects to holism and each has different importance in medicine.

The use of the term holism dates back to 1926 when it was introduced by Jan Smuts. It was used to describe the understanding of the body as a whole system rather than a particular occurrence. Smuts stated that wholes are essential to understanding the parts of complex systems, and for this reason holism is understood by some as a critical response to reductionism.

Reductionism believes that the approach to understanding the nature of complex things is by reducing them to the interactions of their parts. The battle between the philosophy

Doing intensive, masterly specialized work, it was forgotten that every part is still only a piece of the entire body”. This statement summarises the main difference between a holistic model and biomedical model of patient’s assessment and treatment.

Conventional biomedical model, sees health simply as the absence of pathology alongside normal function. On this model of medicine, patients are contestably seen as diseases rather than individuals and diagnosis and treatment are based on individual parts of the body and not on the patients as a whole and its interaction with the world around them. Treatments offered in this model, most of the time involve drugs prescription, procedures and surgeries that are performed by a knowledgeable doctor.

Mainstream medical education, focuses on the study of structures and function of the body, the study of disease processes and the treatment of diseases. This system has a high interventionist principle and a materialist view of the body that doesn’t take into consideration many other factors that might contribute to or undermine human wellbeing. Even with all technological methods of diagnosis, conventional medicine has difficulty in dealing with conditions where a definitive diagnosis can’t be