Practitioners of complementary and alternative medicine should value their strengths

The patient-experienced effect of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) can primarily be attributed to a personal relationship between the provider and patient, and health recommendations within a context with potential symbolic value. The current important challenge for CAM practitioners is to acknowledge that their specific ‘treatments’ should also be mostly reclassified as important symbols, not treatments with direct pathophysiological effects. If this were done, they would hopefully achieve a constructive dialogue with representatives of conventional medicine.