Dr Rakel and his colleagues have created an authoritative, credible, and user-friendly introduction to the "new" field of integrative medicine. Of course, those of us with some gray in our hair will recognize that integrative medicine is hardly new, merely harder and harder to implement. To quote from the first chapter of the book (coauthored by Rakel and Andrew Weil, MD):
This book is organized into 4 parts. The first 16 pages are devoted to the philosophy of integrative medicine and "the Integrative Assessment" (a history almost Ericksonian in its breadth)—a refreshing reminder of why many of us entered primary care in the first place. There is a delightful typo in the first table of the first chapter, "Defining Integrative Medicine." The last line reads, "Healing is always possible, even when cursing is not." I hope they leave it in, in the next edition!