regulators to acknowledge and respond to the broad community use of natural medicine ? Are their models for action in other countries ’ public health spheres that you know of and that we could adopt ? That ’ s a question that ’ s grown grey hair across the scalps of lots of association and industry experts . I think what the ATMS has been doing and is doing will eventually get us there . Initiatives such as Natural Medicine Week , constant social media pressure , political lobbying , representation on government policymaking panels and advisory bodies , all of which strongly reinforce the role that natural medicine can and does play in community healthcare , are effective policies .
In addition to your homeopathic practice , you are also well known for your expertise in business management ( and congratulations on the 4th edition of The Business of Healing ). Thanks !
How did this interest arise ? How did you develop it into expertise – autodidactically , or did you do courses in management ? When I did naturopathy training back in the 1980 ’ s there were about thirty graduating in that year . Five years later about 10 of us were still in practice . Ten years later about five were left and after 20 years , just three . We ’ d had no business training and that ’ s what sent most out of the profession . People ran out of money , or out of patience , or both , so they had to do something else to survive . The main reason that I was able to keep going was that I ’ d done business training before doing naturopathy , had set up and operated two businesses , and used what I ’ d learnt to keep the clinic afloat . I moved from Sydney to Adelaide in 1994 and not long after that I was asked by a local college to teach practice management to their naturopathy students , then another local college asked me to teach it to their homeopathy and Chinese medicine students , and not long after that I was asked to do the same at several other colleges around the country , at Southern Cross University , and at Cornell Uni in the US . Some of the students at Southern Cross told me that they were getting RSI from writing notes and asked if I could write a textbook . That ended up being a book called The Business of Healing .
What proportion of practices do you think fail to flourish because of neglect of the sort of information you ’ ve set out so comprehensively ? Before practice management became a formal element within the curricula of most natural medicine training courses , the failure rate in our profession was very high . After that subject was introduced the extent of that failure improved but those failures still occur . After teaching practice management in lots of places for a long time and having kept in touch with many students over that time , one thing has become abundantly clear . If you ’ re a new practitioner starting out it ’ s critical that you accept that you ’ re a business operator , as well as a healer , and act accordingly . Most of us when we graduate are very heavily invested in clinical practice . It ’ s fascinating and valuable and it ’ s the primary focus of most of the courses that we do , but there ’ s nowhere near enough time given to training in the actual operation of the business that acts as the platform for our clinical practice . In the thousands of hours of teaching that are delivered in some natural medicine courses , the best of them devote a mere 40 hours to practice management . It ’ s simply not enough . Business is the foundation of our clinical practices . As new practitioners if we don ’ t give this the time it deserves - set up a strategy for commercial success and work to that strategy and all of its tactical elements such as practice location , clinic design , pricing , admin , marketing and social media management - we can run out of time , personal wellbeing , job satisfaction , money , and our clinical practice will become simply unsustainable .
What is your view of the state of natural medicine in Australia today ? I think it ’ s healthy . Apart from the business training issue mentioned earlier , there is one other ongoing concern though . Apart from remedial massage providers , the number of local providers of recognised training in naturopathy , nutrition and herbal medicine has shrunk alarmingly over the past few decades and homeopathic medicine training providers have shrunk to just one local operator . Unless things improve in this area we ’ ll see a declining population of natural medicine practitioners as the numbers of outgoing retirees eclipses the number of newly emerged practitioners .
Where do you think natural medicine is heading ? Natural medicine is already mainstream , with the majority of Australians using it in some form . I can ’ t help but feel that , previously mentioned issues notwithstanding , it will continue to have strong community support .
What are the biggest issues facing natural medicine today ? Does homeopathy face issues of its own alongside more generic ones ? The previously mentioned shrinkage of the natural medicine profession and negative impacts from government regulation are probably the two primary issues and these issues are even more important for homeopathy .
How do you suggest that all these issues be addressed ? Do what we can to encourage the growth of natural medicine education providers , improve competence in business management for students and existing practitioners , ensure that we have strong representation in government , and continue to provide high quality sustainable healthcare to our local communities .
Many thanks , Robert , for generously offering your time and your wisdom for this interview . I ’ m sure our readers will benefit hugely .
26 | vol30 | no1 | JATMS