Bridge Building and Integrative Treatment of People with Multiple Sclerosis. Research-based Evaluation of a Team-building Process

Abstract

Background: The Danish Multiple Sclerosis Society has initiated a research project dealing with bridge building and integrative treatment. Little attention has been paid to research on the experience of conventional and alternative practitioners with bridge building and integrative treatment through teamwork. Objective: The objective of this article is to describe essential features of the preparatory phase of the research project focusing on the process of initiating and developing a team of conventional and alternative practitioners before treating people with Multiple Sclerosis at a specialized MS hospital in Denmark. The team consists of five conventional and five alternative practitioners. Materials and Methods: The preparatory phase took place from August 2004 to May 2005. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with the ten team practitioners. Each practitioner was interviewed before and eight months after joining the team, and after participating in four practitioner-researcher seminars. Written materials and participatory observations of practitioner-researcher seminars have been used in addition. Results: The team-building process involved motivation, emotions, challenges, professional and personal competences, and the development of a professional team identity. The practitioners assessed the preparatory phase based on researcher-practitioner seminars as an essential basis for moving on to provide treatments to people with MS.

Complementary and alternative medicine in multiple sclerosis

“…Since many patients combine conventional and alternative treatment without counselling or advice The Danish Multiple Sclerosis Society initiated a research project dealing with bridge building and integrative treatment [15]. The core question raised has been: Is it possible to improve treatment outcomes for MS patients by developing a model for bridge building between conventional and alternative practitioners, and developing an integrative treatment approach?…”

“…The aim of the project is the interdisciplinary cooperation at institutional level (public as well as private) between practitioners to establish integrative treatment. The project will take place from 2004-2010 at a specialised MS hospital in Denmark, where a team of five conventional and five alternative practitioners will work together to develop and offer individualised treatments to 400 MS patients [15]. It will be interesting to what extent integrative medicine can be realised and how it affects treatment outcomes of MS patients.…”

Types of treatment collaboration between conventional and alternative practitioners – results from a research project at a Danish MS hospital

“…The problem of mono-professionalism came to the fore in particular in connection with defining and discussing several basic healthcare concepts such as ‘outcome’, ‘documentation’, ‘improvement’, ‘ill’, ‘healthy’, and ‘diagnosis’, which led to a clash of various perceptions and understandings among practitioners [4, 26, 27, 42–46]. At the same time, the alternative practitioners pointed out that during the project, doctors were more open than expected, which made a positive contribution to collaboration.…”

“…At the same time we assume that these very differences provide the opportunity for learning, reflection and development with regard to treatment as well as to the professional culture within a given treatment collaboration (see also [26]).…”

Use of complementary and alternative medicine in Danish hospitals as reported by charge nurses at department level

“…Use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has increased markedly in the Western world over the past 20 years [1][2][3] and units for integrated medicine (conventional medicine combined with CAM) are increasingly being established in healthcare systems in many countries [4][5][6][7][8][9] .…”