Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona

The health insurance industry, and its practice of not reimbursing doctors who prescribe CAM-type treatments, creates a massive bottleneck that prevents promising integrative treatments from entering the medical mainstream. The Adolph Coors Foundation has awarded a gift to the Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona to support a three-year study of the effect of integrative medicine on health care and health costs.

Specifically, the study will generate a statistically relevant comparison of the health and cost outcomes of two populations of Maricopa County, Arizona, employees … one whose primary care is delivered using an integrative model and the other whose primary care is delivered using a traditional conventional care model. The outcomes generated by this study will be shared with a broad range of medical and health professionals, insurance companies, academics, business leaders and policymakers.