Websites
A Practical Guide to Complementary Therapies for People Living With HIV - www.catie.ca/comp_e.nsf. “The Canadian AIDS Treatment Information Exchange (CATIE) is committed to improving the health and quality of life of all people living with HIV/AIDS”. CATIE's website includes a section entitled A Practical Guide to Complementary Therapies for People Living With HIV. This section includes information about a number of complementary therapies and their uses in HIV/AIDS treatment, information about unconventional therapies, guides for evaluating treatments and choosing practitioners, and numerous resources listed by type of complementary therapy.
AIDS Community Research Initiative of America - www.criany.org/acria.html. "The AIDS Community Research Initiative of America (ACRIA) is a non-profit community-based AIDS research and treatment education center (located in New York, NY). In conjunction with recognized leaders in AIDS research and treatment, primary-care providers, and people living with HIV disease; ACRIA: identifies scientifically promising therapies for AIDS and HIV-related illness, designs and implements studies on these interventions, and submits the findings for publication;
conducts research geared towards the further understanding of HIV disease, treatment, and prevention; and
provides education about AIDS treatments and research to the communities affected by HIV/AIDS." Searching the website for "complementary medicine" yields a number of resources, including a user's guide; a resource guide of books, classes, services, products, and websites; and an ACRIA update that includes an overview of current complementary therapies, a look at complementary therapy at sites around the country, the relationship between complementary medicine and research, and a list of natural remedies for HIV-related maladies.
AIDSinfo - aidsinfo.nih.gov/clinical_trials/. This United States Department of Health and Human Services website includes links to clinical trials utilizing complementary and alternative medicine treatments for HIV-positive patients. Treatments include Reiki, stress management, immune restoration by lipoic acid, treatment of depression with massage in end-of-life AIDS, acupressure, acupuncture, and others.
Bastyr University AIDS Research Center - www.bastyr.edu/research/buarc. BUARC was established in 1994 under a cooperative grant from the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) and the National Center on Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM). BUARC’s mission is to describe forms and patterns of use of complementary & alternative medicine (CAM) for the treatment of HIV/AIDS; screen and evaluate therapies from the NCCAM's program areas of CAM; and provide consultation and support to the medical and research community in the scientific evaluation of CAM therapies. This website includes information on BUARC's latest scientific activities.
Complementary/Alternative Health Care and HIV/AIDS: Legal, Ethical, and Policy Issues in Regulation - www.aidslaw.ca/Maincontent/issues/cts/cam/toc.htm. Complemtary/Alternative Health Care and HIV/AIDS: Legal, Ethical, and Policy Issues in Regulation “is the first in a series of papers to be produced by the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network as part of a project on Legal, Ethical and Policy Issues Related to HIV/AIDS Care, Treatment and Support… This paper begins with an overview of some of the available information regarding these medical, social, and personal dimensions of CAM use, drawing upon data from Canada and other comparable settings. With this context in mind, the paper then discusses a number of ethical issues related to the use of complementary and/or alternative health-care practices, based on the four key ethical principles of non-maleficence, beneficence, respect for autonomy, and justice. This evidentiary and ethical analysis leads to a number of conclusions in the areas of research, education/training, and regulation. The last section considers the Canadian legal context for regulating complementary/alternative health-care products and practitioners; the reader can assess whether the current regulatory environment is acceptable in light of the ethical considerations outlined.” The paper is also downloadable on the site as a PDF document. For more information about this publication you may also call the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network
at (514) 397-6828.
Consumer Health Information Service - hml.org/CHIS. This site is a community service of the Hawaii Medical Library. It includes a very comprehensive glossary of complementary therapies, as well as links to articles, organizations, online databases, specific herbal therapies, and to websites where you can search for CAM practitioners.
Doc Misha's Chicken Soup Chinese Medicine - www.docmisha.com. This website provides general information about Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), a section on TCM and women, and a hepatitis help area (an East-West approach). It also includes the HIV Wellness Center: Living Well with HIV. This section includes information on combining Eastern and Western therapies in treating HIV/AIDS, and other information about using Chinese medicine in treating for HIV, including the immune system. Other sections include recipes and message boards.
HerbMed - www.herbmed.org. A project of the Alternative Medicine Foundation, Inc., this site is an interactive, electronic herbal database with hyperlinked access to scientific data underlying the use of herbs for health.
Immune Enhancement Project - www.iepclinic.com/. The "Immune Enhancement Project is a non-profit Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) clinic (located in San Francisco, California). First founded in 1983 as a grassroots response to the AIDS epidemic, IEP is a widely respected resource both in the field of HIV treatment and TCM. During the past two decades, IEP has expanded the reach of complementary therapies and created a model for community-based healthcare for HIV disease." The Resources section includes IEP newsletter articles about developments in TCM treatment for HIV/AIDS, personal stories, and web links.
MEDLINEplus Alternative Medicine - www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/alternativemedicine.html. This site is a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine and the National Institute of Health. It includes information regarding clinical trials, research, specific conditions/aspects, practitioner directories, law and policy, organizations, and specific populations (children, teenagers, and women).
National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine - nccam.nih.gov. NCCAM is one of the 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health. Its mission is to support rigorous research on complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), to train researchers in CAM, and to disseminate information to the public and professionals on which CAM modalities work, which do not, and why. This comprehensive CAM website includes links to academic research centers, databases (such as CAM on PubMed), and other helpful information. Information on HIV/AIDS and CAM is accessible via a website search engine.
NOAH: New York Online Access to Health - www.noah-health.org. New York library organizations established this website, which provides health information in both English and Spanish. The Health Topics section includes information on alternative care and treatments for HIV/AIDS. The Resources section includes comprehensive information on alternative healing approaches; and a comprehensive list of other CAM resources, including links to online journals, government resources, research centers, and to websites for locating practitioners.
Richard and Hinda Rosenthal Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine - www.rosenthal.hs.columbia.edu. The Rosenthal Center's broad goals are to contribute to the informed research and practice of complementary and alternative medicine and to foster the development of a more comprehensive and inclusive medical system. This website includes information on the Center’s research projects, courses, and events. A resources section is organized for the specific needs of three main groups (although all areas are accessible to anyone): the CAM Columbia community, patients and consumers, and professionals and researchers. Additionally, there is information about internet and other general resources.
The Alternative Medicine Homepage - www.pitt.edu/~cbw/altm.html. Created and maintained by a medical librarian with the Health Sciences Library System, University of Pittsburgh, this page includes many references for complementary and alternative medicine in the following categories: AIDS and HIV, databases of practitioners, internet resources, mailing lists and newsgroups, government resources, and related resources.
The Body: An AIDS and HIV Information Resource – Complementary, Alternative and Holistic Therapies - www.thebody.com/treat/altern.html#research. This site includes a short basic section about complementary medicine, and a more comprehensive overview about complementary therapies used by people living with HIV. It also includes a variety of HIV/AIDS-related links for information including research, personal accounts, interviews, articles, book, and buyer’s groups.
