"Rooted in the relationship"
The film maker Benedikt Schulte presents Anthroposophic Medicine in a series of short films entitled ‘The Art of Healing’. The films provide an insight into the medical practice, inviting experts, researchers, students and patients to share their experiences and casting a light on the history of Anthroposophic Medicine.
The paediatrician David Martin, professor of Medical Theory and Integrative and Anthroposophic Medicine at Witten-Herdecke University in Germany, describes one of the central aspects of Anthroposophic Medicine: “We have to develop a medicine that offers the whole range of possibilities on the basis of which physicians and parents can choose what is the right thing to do in a given context. In order to achieve this, we need perceptiveness and sensitivity; we need to be present, with the patient, well rooted in the relationship – that will create the foundation for a good medicine.” Matthias Girke, who is head of the Medical Section and co-producer of the film series ‘The Art of Healing’, also speaks of starting by perceiving the individual patient in order to find out what they need and respond accordingly.
Anthroposophic Medicine focuses on the question of regaining health and develops therapeutic concepts in order to activate the human organism. The underlying view of the human being is that described by Friedrich Schiller as “It is the spirit that builds up the body”. The aim is to treat the whole human being. The physician Ita Wegman and Rudolf Steiner laid the foundations for this medicine a hundred years ago.
Anthroposophic Medicine ranges from A&E to general practice to art therapies. It has hospitals with intensive care units, such as the Covid-19 ward at the Havelhöhe Community Hospital in Berlin, Germany, and outpatient clinics that provide medical and nursing care as well as therapies. The seven episodes in this series of films, each of which is about 15 minutes long, describe the integrative approach of Anthroposophic Medicine, providing examples of specialist areas such as paediatrics, oncology and pharmacy and of research topics such as how to respond when children are running a temperature. Because of Sars-CoV-2 restrictions applying during filming, the documentation had to be limited to Anthroposophic Medicine in Germany and Switzerland.
Film series: ‘The Art of Healing’ (seven episodes; with English subtitles)
Image: Screenshot from the short film ‘The Art of Healing’
Translation by Margot M. Saar