AHPA’s Dentali Attends NCCAM Stakeholder Roundtable
The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) held a Stakeholder Roundtable on Tuesday, April 26, on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) campus in Bethesda, Md. AHPA’s Chief Science Officer Steven Dentali, PhD, attended and was one of about 40 participants that included representatives from the American Health Association, the American Pharmacists Association, the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians, the American Nurses Association, AARP, the Arthritis Foundation, the American Medical Association, and many more.
After Josephine Briggs, MD, NCCAM’s director, provided insight into NCCAM’s legislative mandate, she covered the major goals of NCCAM’s strategic plan, remarking that more than 5,000 public comments were received during the process of creating it. She also focused on the importance of integration of CAM practices and announced the launch of the agency’s new web portal resources for health care providers. The remainder of the meeting was an open dialogue with the attendee organizations.
“The clear message I heard from NCCAM was its desire to continue to strengthen partnerships, including those with industry,” says Dr. Dentali. “NCCAM is often seen just as a funder of research, and this meeting highlighted the agency’s interest in industry and those with more of both a practitioner and patient focus. The range of discussion during this productive exchange included curriculum development for medical students, building the evidence for CAM modalities, and the importance of the patient-practitioner dialogue,” he adds.
http://www.ahpa.org/Default.aspx?tabid=69&aId=663