Welcome to the fourth symposium organised by the European Traditional Chinese Medicine Association (ETCMA).

Our theme, “Where should Chinese medicine position itself in the West’, has been chosen to help us explore where Chinese medicine currently stands in the healthcare systems of the West and where we would perhaps like to be, or should be.

There are many debates within the profession about what we actually mean by ‘complementary’ and/or ‘alternative’ medicine and ‘integrated’ medicine. 

How important is it for Chinese medicine to remain ‘alternative’ and retain its authenticity as a distinct medical system within societies dominated by biomedicine? 

Is ‘integrated medicine’ the goal we are aiming for and how wary should we be of the ‘compromises’ that might need to be made in becoming part of mainstream healthcare systems? Can a truly integrated healthcare system emerge and who would decide what this looked like? 

We are privileged to have a number of speakers willing to share their views and vision around these issues, including Paul Kadetz (Department of International Development, University of Oxford, UK), Herman van Wietmarschen (Sino-Dutch Centre for Personalised and Preventive Medicine, Leiden University, the Netherlands) and Prof.Gustav Dobos (Chair of Complementary and Integrative Medicine, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany).

The venue for the symposium is the Grand Hotel Casselbergh in the heart of Bruges, Belgium. There is a welcome dinner on the Friday evening before the symposium, providing an opportunity to meet informally over great food and intoxicating liquor!

We would very much like to see you there!

Please use this registration form to register.

More information including the programme can be found in this PDF document