BELGRADE DECLARATION

ECIM 2014

7TH European Congress for Integrative Medicine

Strong support for establishing European

Consortium for Integrative Medicine

Belgrade, Serbia

October 10 – 11, 2014

Health is not just the absence of disease; it is a state of physical, mental, emotional spiritual and social wellbeing.

There is permanent need to transform health care in order to keep the health. Employing a personalized strategy that considers the patient’s unique conditions, needs and circumstances, it uses the most appropriate interventions from an array of scientific disciplines to heal illness and disease and help people regain and maintain optimum health and prevent negative environmental influences that affect a person’s health.

The only way to achieve this strategy is to move the boundaries of the existing field of medicine towards including the wisdom inherent in healing the whole person —mind, body and spirit. It can be done only through Integrative medicine that makes use of all appropriate therapeutic approaches, healthcare professionals and disciplines to achieve optimal health and healing and where the patient is center of all acitivities .

On the 6th ECIM, 2013., Berlin, Germany, it had been adopted the initiative for defining and acceptance declaration ( BELGRADE DECLARATION) related to establishing European Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine (ECAHC).

This initiative has been strongly supported by Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine (AHC), Washington, USA.

The participants of ECIM 2014 recognized the importance of defining mission and vision to bring the experience, expertise and valuable methods of Integrative Medicine in order to improve the health of patients around the Europe.

Mission

To improve the quality of medical care by preserving and advancing the principles and practices of integrative healthcare within academic institutions, health service, governments and other relevant regulatory institutions worldwide Europe . Accepting and singing the Belgrade Declaration these institutions would become the members of European Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine (ECAHC).

Mission incorporates the prevention of diseases through education, promotion of healthy lifestyles and systematic application of natural resources by trained physicians of integrative medicine.

Vision

Education of medical providers and patients will allow them to understand the value and integrate into their clinical practice the time-proven methods of Integrative medicine.

This is particularly important because the European aging population requires an integrated approach to treat effectively many chronic diseases and to improve the quality of life .

Plan is to achieve goal by establishing coordinated educational and training efforts. Goal is to engage the finest international experts in the field of Integrative medicine and to task them with developing the best training and educational materials.

These experts will work in a collaborative manner. They will adhere to the highest ethical standards and work steadfast to bring mission to fruition. Also, they will respect any regional, cultural and ethnic differences.

All educational materials will be available to those who seek knowledge and who consider the best interest of their patients as their primary goal. The educational materials will also be available to all patients who want to improve their health.

Collaborative endeavor is not only duty, but also a tribute to many of those who dedicated their lifetime work to this cause. This work will be a great honor to continue for the benefit of eliminating diseases, and improving health and wellbeing of people around Europe.

This work will be a great honor to continue for the benefit of eliminating diseases, and improving health and wellbeing of people around Europe.

Project Outline

It is recognized that this long-term project of introducing and implementing all authoratative institutions and professionals that are dealing with Quality of Life will be implemented in different phases, including harmonization with paradigm of great clinical relevance .

As the first step in this long process, the following points for future work are:

• Transforming Health Care educational program (e.g. schools of medicine, nursing, pharmacy and allied health) worldwide the Europe by incorporation sufficent information related to evidence-based knowledge of Complementary Medicine.
• Recognition the sacred and healing nature of the relationships between patients and health care providers and acknowledge that humanism, compassion and caring are central to health and healing.
• Recognition that the empowered patient is the responsible central actor in healing, self-care and prevention and that person’s right about making decision related to the choice of healing is the imperative for medical provider.
• Organizing health care system that creates an environment which supports healing relationships and recognizes that in order to be healing and empowering, healers themselves must be restored and whole .
• Support truly integrative medicine that offers the highest standards of excellence in a full and complete array of care modalities
• Embracement the spiritual dimension of life and acknowledgement the importance of context and intention in the healing process for patients, caregivers and medical providers.
• Belief in giving voice to the patient, in the openness of healers and in honest and supportive communications among all members of the Health Care Community
• Support the efforts of medical providers to develop open- minded integrative approach, which are as important as medical knowledge and technical skills to the process of healing.
• Dedication to the change necessary to bring about the achievement in an optimal healing environment expressing the need for urgent action by European Council, all European countries’ governments, European Academy of Science and Art, European Universities, European Health Care institutions, and all health and development workers that could be inside the European Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine (ECAHC) in order to protect and promote the health of all people around the Europe.