Respiratory and allergic diseases: from upper respiratory tract infections to asthma

This article aims to familiarize the primary care physician with the complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) practices of many patients with respiratory diseases. The physician who wishes to develop a more comprehensive scope of practice will learn about complementary modalities that are safe and applicable to his or her own patients. For the purpose of this article, the author follows the National Institutes of Health's classification of CAM, which encompasses all modalities not currently taught in medical school, including the more mainstream ones such as nutrition and mind-body interventions [1]. Lately, however, the rise in interest in CAM has led to the addition of lectures in nutrition and mind-body interventions to many medical school curricula, and an elective CAM course is available in 50% of the schools [2].