Practical Guidance

Interested in incorporating anthroposophic approaches into your medical practice? Or curious to know more about what anthroposophic medicine can do for you?

Anthroposophic medicine’s therapeutic approach is unique from both the perspective of the care giver and the perspective of the patient. But what does that mean in terms of daily clinical practice for integrative health professionals and their patients?

Most essentially for both, anthroposophic approaches place a high value on the doctor-patient relationship. The therapeutic approach involves first understanding a patient’s biographical data (personal history and lifestyle), emotional state and mental health, overall well-being (including spiritual health) as well as physical health and symptoms of disease or injury; a foundation of trust between care-giver and receiver is necessary to achieve that understanding.

There are additional guidelines and training opportunities available for practitioners, and key value-adds for patients, in the integrative approach.

For doctors, nurses and other medical professionals interested in adding anthroposophic techniques to their practices, the Medical Section of the Goethanum maintains a list of training opportunities by specialty and by country. It is available here.

For patients interested in the experience of anthroposophic medicine from the perspective of recipients of this form of health care, IVAA recommends contacting the members of the European Federation of Patients’ Associations for Anthroposophic Medicine (EFPAM), who will be aware of up-to-date anthroposophic patients activities happening in your country. Their member list is available here. To find an anthroposophic doctor or other medical professional directly, please see IVAA’s own list of members, who keep up-to-date information on practitioners within their representative countries.