Objectives

Modern medicine needs a pluralistic approach
If the concept of what health and disease is varies from person to person, it stands to reason that a multitude of diagnostic and therapeutic methods will be needed to accommodate these variations.
The more specific the methods, the better equipped they are to deal with the particularities and needs of individualized cases. Today's pluralistic society demands methodological diversity. Patients should be able to choose the medicine that best suits them. Despite this, modern medicine is generally dominated by a one-sided materialistic school of thought, which assumes that the human organism can be fully explained by the laws of physics and chemistry.
This means that 'conventional medicine' covers only the material aspect of human existence - everything else is systematically excluded. This simplistic medical theory, therefore, is not qualified to make general pronouncements concerning the more holistic aspects of medicine. Moreover, almost no research has been done by conventional schools on possible alternative approaches. Hence: "The European Parliament calls on the Commission to initiate a process of recognition of unconventional medicine and, to this end, to take the necessary steps to establish competent committees" (Resolution on the status of unconventional medicine A4-0075/97 , 29/5/1997 - European Parliament).

Reward and challenge
Patients using high-tech medicine often find it interesting to receive intensive personal care from an anthroposophic doctor. During the encounter they experience the respect and concern they seek as patients. Moreover, not only can they take part in the various therapeutic procedures, they are encouraged to do so actively, a rare occurrence in conventional medicine. The doctor's interest in taking the patient's history is not superficial; it is indeed one of the essential tools of his or her trade. To treat a patient satisfactorily, the physician must gain a complete understanding of the individual in all his complexity. For anthroposophic physicians, it is a fascinating challenge to be able to utilize the full spectrum of medical procedures - conventional and complementary - in the treatment of a patient. They see the unlimited choice of treatment as a valuable and indispensable asset that they possess.

Anthroposophic medicine is modern
What makes anthroposophical medicine so modern is that it takes into account the individual as a whole. Nowadays, patients don't want to be treated by seeing them only as a disease, but as an individual who has a disease.
Anthroposophical medicine continues to develop alongside the pace of progress in medicine. It is constantly embracing new issues and trends, seeking means to reflect the latest interpretations of illness and health. Over the past few decades, for example, anthroposophic physicians have developed an internationally recognized treatment program for addicts. Once the benefit of a new diagnostic or treatment procedure is demonstrated, it is accepted so that it can be incorporated into the range of medical options. Anthroposophic medicine also pursues its own scientific research. In conventional medicine, which is science-based, the expertise of physicians in the field is rigid with respect to methodology. This is the premise of randomized (two groups are randomly divided), placebo-controlled (compared to placebo), double-blind trials (neither doctor nor patient knows who has the real drug and who has the placebo). Such trials replace the doctor-patient consultative relationship with generalised, experimental and anonymous situations, in stark contrast to the usual therapeutic reality.
Clinical pharmacologist Georges Fülgraff describes the process as follows: "It involves replacing reality with models. The more complex the reality, the simpler the models, until, ironically, the only part of reality that is perceived is that which appears in the model. In this way, we have now mastered the medical experience: treatment is based on models, not reality."
To prove the effectiveness of their treatment methods, anthroposophical scientists try to use the new scientific methods and develop them even further, allowing anthroposophical therapy, with its many approaches, to be proven in everyday practice. Anthroposophical medicine is constantly changing. This is another reason why it is so modern.