About

Friends of Anthroposophic Medicine is a representative body for those patients and practitioners who are interested in and work out Anthroposophic Medicine. 

As an extension of western medicine, Anthroposophic Medicine is a holistic, integrative, and salutogenic medical approach established over 100 years ago by Rudolf Steiner. It takes the view of ‘’a whole human being’’ and gives equal importance to the structure and composition of the physical body, its vitality and rhythms, the soul/emotional life of the patient, and the individuality/spirituality of the person.  With Rudolf Steiner Ph.D working with Ita Wegman, M.D., and other physicians,  anthroposophic medicine was conceived from the beginning as an integrative, multimodal and individualized approach to healthcare of patients, where physicians, pharmacists, nurses and various therapists work together to expand–not replace–conventional medical approaches. It was formulated and developed after requests from physicians (and later other therapists and as well as patients) to have a more complete and holistic view of the human being and broader and safer approaches to treat illnesses.

Anthroposophic doctors prescribe both conventional and anthroposophic medicinal products supported by nurses and pharmacies. Therapists support individuals through artistic activities, body movement, counselling, and psychotherapy work.

In brief, anthroposophic medicine has several components. It takes the knowledge and insights from Rudolf Steiner’s anthroposophy (“consciousness and knowledge of the human being”) and applies the developed fourfold view mentioned above in a rigorous way to human health and illness. Deeper knowledge and insights into nature and its processes can then be used to make corresponding natural remedies and other therapeutic interventions for various corresponding illnesses or functional pathophysiology. Illness, whether functional or pathological, is seen fundamentally as an imbalance or abnormal functioning between the fourfold factors in an ill person’s organism that must be corrected and brought into functional harmony, and reverse, as much as is possible, the pathological diseased states. Symptoms are seen as an attempt by the human organism that often–but not always—inadequately or inappropriately deal with the underlying pathology. Therefore, symptoms are not usually suppressed (unless the patient’s life or an organ is in danger) and are instead appropriately guided with natural, conscientiously-prescribed remedies, or other modalities, to overcome the illness and regain balanced health. Depending on medical necessity, this may also include judicious use of conventional drugs and interventions. True health in anthroposophic medicine is seen as a balanced and dynamic state which is in accordance with the healthy fourfold functioning of the human being within three major functioning organic systems that are interactively and dynamically working throughout the human organism. These major functioning systems, both physiological and morphological, form another aspect of the human constitution and include the nerve-sense system, the rhythmic system and the metabolic-limb system, as these are differentially expressed throughout the human being. While illnesses certainly are treated in anthroposophic medicine, there is usually an attempt to at the same time support the patient’s own healing capacities (salutogenesis) in the context of their fourfold factors and threefold organic functioning systems.