Non-pharmacological treatments for epilepsy: the case for and against complementary and alternative medicines

The use of ‘alternative’, ‘complementary’ and ‘conventional’ as adjunctive terms in medicine has emerged from a predominantly Western perspective on the treatment of disease. Definitions of what constitutes a complementary or alternative medicine (CAM) vary, but CAM is generally used as an umbrella term to refer to any treatment that falls outside the sphere of the conventional Western medical school syllabus. While many CAM treatments are derived from mystical or spiritual schemas of understanding of health and disease, others are based on theories and hypotheses that depart to a greater or lesser extent from mainstream scientific thinking.