Conventional medicines can be very helpful in acute conditions such as pain due to physical trauma or many infections. They are also life-saving in situations such as heart attacks, sepsis, blood clots, where rapid acting medication make a real difference. However, in chronic diseases, conventional medicines alone may not be fully effective and may cause many side effects.

From my point of view, the best treatment is combining the best of conventional medicine with complementary therapies because the right combination will provide you with the most benefits and the least side effects.

This is not always as easy as a wide knowledge of both fields is required. It is here where the importance of Integrated Holistic Medicine is noticeable.

For example Recurrent infections:

Infections can be caused by bacteria or viruses. It is our immune system that fights against them producing cells which destroy dangerous bacteria and viruses. Our body needs to raise its temperature to increase the production of these cells. If our immune system fails, the infection spreads and may cause sepsis and eventually death if not treated correctly.

So, if you take drugs, such as paracetamol or ibuprofen, (when not indicated) to stop the fever, you are also stopping your immune system from producing the necessary immune cells. If you take antibiotics, when not indicated, you will not only eliminate your "good bacteria", but also help “bad bacteria” becoming resistant against it. Antibiotics are only indicated in bacterial infections, not in viral infections as viruses are not affected by this type of medicine.

So, if you stop the fever and take antibiotics every time you have an infection, your immune system will not be able to work properly and bacteria will become harder to eliminate.