Rating: 
Summary: This book bridges science and healing
Review: Dr. Oschman has collected recent research from a wide variety of fields and presented it in a concise, easy to understand, yet rigorous and well documented way. It will leave skeptics speechless and give healers and bodyworkers a scientific perspective on their art. It will also give scientists much food for thought accelerating research in the field of human energy.
Rating:
Summary: New Directions for Scientific and Heart-centered Medicine
Review: Every chapter of this well-written and thoroughly researched book will excite the inquiring mind. The author has written about highly technical new research in a readable and engaging manner. The material describes research of recent decades that will revolutionize future healing methods. The 21st century will be the century of energy medicine, without abandoning biochemical methods. Dr.Oschman has explored the scientific basis for many so-called complementary healing methods, such as Reiki, Therapeutic Touch, Polarity Therapy.
It is a seminal book that will be read and discussed for many years to come.
Rating:
Summary: A remarkable overview
Review: I have just received this remarkable book, skimmed it, and rate it highly already, in spite of the poor opinion Mr. Budnkik formed of it. As it states "this is a work in progress," but its value is in outlining a large number of invetigations of the field of energy and healing, too many to explore exhastively, but each chapter is accompanied by a list of references, mostly to the scientific literature to permit further study. My life experience includes the National Academy of Science, Rockefeller University, and 30 years as Executive VP of the New York Heart Association. I am neither naive, nor gullible.
Rating:
Summary: Exceptional compilation of research
Review: I received this book from Amazon a few days ago and am halfway through it. I'm so impressed by Oschman's compilation of research - it's provided me with countless answers I've been seeking all my life. I am a degreed mechanical engineer, and am currently getting an advanced degree in Oriental Medicine. I've also been practicing Reiki and other energy healing modalities for several years, having been drawn into these alternative healing fields because of my natural ability for sensing subtle energies ever since I was little. Until I started reading Oschman's book I never had a scientific explanation for this energy or why it was so helpful in healing others. I've always known that these energies are real but I definitely appreciate a scientific explanation for any type of energy phenomenon - it makes it much easier to explain to others who haven't had similar experiences why and how they happen. I meet a lot of people who are interested in energy healing and some who are quite skeptical of its validity. Thanks to this book, I now have a clear way of explaining what I and countless others have known all along - that energy medicine really does work. If you're simply curious about why energy medicine works, or you're a practitioner yourself and have wanted a scientific way of explaining its validity to your friends and clients, you'll definitely appreciate this book (even with the $40 price tag). Keep in mind, however, that this book will not teach you how to practice any of these energy medicine techniques - it will simply give you a very clear and easy way to explain why they work.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Scientific Overview of Energy Medicine
Review: James Oschman's compelling book, ENERGY MEDICINE, provides an excellent scientific overview of the healing power of subtle energy fields. As scientists increasingly recognize how living organisms consist of dynamic energy systems based on familiar kinds of physical field phenomena, we can all begin to see that "vibrational therapies are not magic or superstition: they are based on biology, chemistry, and physics."Oschman guides the reader through a delightful series of beautifully-illustrated chapters that present well-organized pieces of a bridge between scientific information and complementary medicine. While western medical practioners have long been aware that rapid and spontaneous remissions occur for even the most potent cancers and the most catastrophic injuries, they have been slower to establish and evaluate workable explanations for how such healing can occur. ENERGY MEDICINE thoroughly examines the most current scientific theories and experimental findings to describe how a wide variety of complementary medical treatments operate within the realm of what we know to be true. I hope that ENERGY MEDICINE will be required reading in schools the world over, because it presents scientific research without side-stepping around the most interesting aspects of healing (such as spontaneous remissions). When you read ENERGY MEDICINE, you'll learn how: our cells and tissues are crystalline molecular arrays that act as coherent antennas, humans respond to the Schumann oscillations around the Earth, a mechanism for entrainment operates between the Earth and humans, and superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs) can be used to detect biomagnetic fields around the human body. You'll also discover a wealth of fascinating facts, such as how the ventricle of the heart is formed of a single band of muscle wrapped in a double-helix in such a way that the heart's rhythmic beatings resonate with the more rapid oscillations of DNA. ENERGY MEDICINE is a must for anyone who desires a more complete understanding of the scientific basis for complementary and alternative medicine.
Rating:
Summary: The communicating whole
Review: Oschman did something quite exceptional in this book; he expressed my understanding of the way living things work, but went beyond my dark intuitive sense of the significance of the whole, to a crisp,intellectual, yet poetic, expression of the parts in relation to that whole
Rating: 
Summary: A flawed attempt
Review: The book attempts to bridge the gap between intuitive approaches to healing based on various concepts of energy and scientific understanding. It paints a marvelous picture of the intricate structure of the human body starting from the internal structure of the cell. There are many things happening in that structure that we have little or no understanding of. Electromagnetic fields play a role in healing bones and have many other effects yet to be discovered. However showing that various explanations are possible or consistent with our current understanding is a long way from providing evidence to support them. I applaud the effort to connect these intuitive healing methods to our scientific understanding. It is difficult to give appropriate weight to each approach. The book fails to give adequate weight to our scientific understanding of what is required to provide evidence that an approach is medically effective. There is no mention in the book of the placebo effect and this is a great illustration of this problem. If patients believe a treatment is effective than a significant percentage of them will improve compared to a similar group not treated no matter what the treatment actually does. This is the clearest example we have of the extraordinary power of the mind and body to heal itself. For that reason alone it deserves mention. Because of the Placebo effect, anecdotal evidence means little or nothing in establishing the objective efficacy of a treatment. Failure to mention this difficulty and describe the problem it presents in evaluating many of the claims is a serious flaw that will mislead unsophisticated readers.
Rating:
Summary: expansive, objective, thorough
Review: The problem with many books on all types of energy healing are the moments when well-meaning but hopelessly uninformed authors try to explain the "why" of their practice. Why does energy healing work? What is the physiological mechanism for this phenomenon? While authors whose practice is informed by their psychic knowledge (Barbara Brennan, Rosalyn Bruyere, etc.) are certainly valuable, James Oschman is successful in this book because he is first and only a scientist. He has no agenda to defend the validity of energy healing at all costs. In fact, you get the sense that he would be just as happy DISproving the phenomenon. And his objectivity in showing that in fact there IS a scientific basis for the practice is what makes this book absolutely priceless. The topics covered are surprisingly far-ranging. I was even skeptical of some of the chapter headings, but the author is so reasonable, and his claims so well-documented that even the most open-minded might find themselves taking a new look at topics they never considered. The chapters on crystal healing and the emotional impact of posture, respectively, were for me particularly fascinating. Some of the most fascinating scientific reading I've done in years. His description of the physical body as a liquid crystalline system, the mechanics of how movement strengthens this system, and how the physical liquid crystal interacts with and is the basis for the energetic system is remarkably beautiful. There are many moments where the scientific meets the spiritual in this book and it's so beautiful. What this book is not: This book is not an instruction manual. I noticed at least one other review seemed to say it was an instruction manual. There are no instructions as to how to practice any of the many techniques covered. The book is for people who already know how to do these things or people who don't want to know HOW but rather WHY IT WORKS. A fabulous reference for those who would like to give clients a more lucid explanation for why various forms of energy healing might work, or at least more current theories on the topic. Worth the price of the book for the bibliography alone.
Rating:
Summary: expansive, objective, thorough
Review: The problem with many books on all types of energy healing are the moments when well-meaning but hopelessly uninformed authors try to explain the "why" of their practice. Why does energy healing work? What is the physiological mechanism for this phenomenon? While authors whose practice is informed by their psychic knowledge (Barbara Brennan, Rosalyn Bruyere, etc.) are certainly valuable, James Oschman is successful in this book because he is first and only a scientist. He has no agenda to defend the validity of energy healing at all costs. In fact, you get the sense that he would be just as happy DISproving the phenomenon. And his objectivity in showing that in fact there IS a scientific basis for the practice is what makes this book absolutely priceless. The topics covered are surprisingly far-ranging. I was even skeptical of some of the chapter headings, but the author is so reasonable, and his claims so well-documented that even the most open-minded might find themselves taking a new look at topics they never considered. The chapters on crystal healing and the emotional impact of posture, respectively, were for me particularly fascinating. Some of the most fascinating scientific reading I've done in years. His description of the physical body as a liquid crystalline system, the mechanics of how movement strengthens this system, and how the physical liquid crystal interacts with and is the basis for the energetic system is remarkably beautiful. There are many moments where the scientific meets the spiritual in this book and it's so beautiful. What this book is not: This book is not an instruction manual. I noticed at least one other review seemed to say it was an instruction manual. There are no instructions as to how to practice any of the many techniques covered. The book is for people who already know how to do these things or people who don't want to know HOW but rather WHY IT WORKS. A fabulous reference for those who would like to give clients a more lucid explanation for why various forms of energy healing might work, or at least more current theories on the topic. Worth the price of the book for the bibliography alone.
Rating:
Summary: A Solid Scientific Text
Review: This book is a solid cornerstone of the bridge linking rigorous scientific theory and intuitive, energy healing techniques. I disagree with Paul Budnik's review stating that the Placebo Effect is not addressed in the book. True, it is only mentioned explicitly on page 17 (in as far as I've read so far...) but great lengths are taken to explain how a person's thought processes, including their beliefs about themselves, have a very real physical manifestation in the form of electrical pulses which generate magnetic fields which are detected by and affect the entire body. Energy therapy such as polarity, Reiki, and acupuncture have been shown to work at the same frequency range of the electromagnetic spectrum as pulsed electromagnetic field (PEMF) therapy. PEMF has been used by Western medicine for some time to aid in the healing of bone which is not healing on its own. (See Bassett C A L 1995 Bioelectromagnetics in the service of medicine. In: Blank M (ed) Electromagnetic fields: biological interactions and mechanisms. Advances in Chemistry Series 250. American Chemical Society, Washington DC, pp 261-275) All in all, a fascinating and thorough exploration of an important, emerging field. A must for anyone involved in or curious about bodywork, energy work, or any form of medicine.
| 
