Yesterday I walked over to the public library in Quill Lake, Saskatchewan, and spotted a medical dictionary I hadn’t seen before: Black’s Medical Dictionary, 37th Edition, published in 1992.
I eagerly turned to the letter “C” to look up the word “cure“. But it wasn’t there. I then turned to the letter “I”, looking for “incurable“. Not there either.
I wasn’t surprised. It wasn’t the first time. I’ve discovered that the word “cure” is not to be found in many medical dictionaries, including:
Black’s Page without “cure”
Webster’s New World Medical Dictionary, Third Edition, 2008, The Oxford Concise Medical Dictionary, Ninth Edition, 2015, The Bantam Medical Dictionary, Sixth Edition, 2009, Barron’s Dictionary of Medical Terms, Sixth Edition, 2013 , Medical Terminology for Dummies, Second Edition, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursing, Edition 6, 2014, Minidictionary for Nurses (Oxford Paperback Reference) 6th Edition, The Lexicon Medicum, Seventh Edition, also known as Hooper’s Medical Dictionary, 1838 – not one provides a definition for the word “cure“. The London Medical Dictionary, published in 1819, uses the word cure several times but does not provide a definition.
Maybe I need to check a medical reference text? But no, that’s no better. Cure, cures, curing, and cured are not defined in Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy, 11th Edition, Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine, Lange’s Current Medical Diagnosis and Treatment, nor in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM–5).
It’s official, cure is not defined medically, demonstrated by the absence of a definition of cure in any scientific or medical reference, much less one that is generally recognized, understood, and taught by the medical bureaucracies.
Do any cures exist? Actually, cures do exist in medicine. An infection might be cured by an antibiotic, or by a surgical procedure that kills or removes the infecting agent. There are medical tests and protocols to measure and document cured for many infections. Cured is defined when the cure is brought about by a medicine.
But cured is not defined, when the cure comes from health. “There is no cure for the common cold” – translation? There is no MEDICAL cure for the common cold. The common cold, influenza, measles, depression, and many other diseases are often cured by health. Healthier people get fewer colds and flu, and cure them faster. People who are less healthy get more colds and flu, and it takes longer to cure.
And cured is not defined for any chronic disease. Chronic diseases have chronic causes. The cure for a chronic disease is a healthy change that addresses the chronic cause. Cures occur often, from changes in habits – smoking cough is cured by stopping smoking, and chronic depression caused by malnutrition can be cured by a healthy diet. But when a chronic disease is cured by medicine, cataracts are cured by surgery, – its not considered a chronic disease – so no chronic diseases are cured.
Cured is not defined for any mental disorders. The logic is interesting. Illnesses are cured by addressing the cause. But if a mental disorder is cured by addressing the cause – then it wasn’t a mental disorder. Depression cured with a healthy diet wasn’t depression, it was malnutrition, and so on…..
Why is cure not in the medical dictionaries? There is another important reason.
Cure is a verb. Medical researchers are searching for NOUNS that cure, medicines, treatments, that can be patented and sold for a profit. Verbs are service industries. Not very profitable. So cure is not in the medical dictionary.
What if you have a disease, and you cure it? Cure, cures, curing, and cured are not defined for ANY non-infectious disease: arthritis, Alzheimer’s, cancer, Chron’s, depression, diabetes, gout, hypertension, obesity, and yes, even scurvy. Not defined. There is no test for cured for any of these diseases – so no cures can be found.
If you cure your disease – your cure will not be recognized, because you can’t prove a cure when cured is not defined. Any disease cured by health, cannot be recognized as cured by our current medical bureaucracies. Not one.
Where does that leave cures? If you want to cure any non-infectious disease, or any disease commonly cured by health – you cannot find a cure in the medical profession. You cannot find a cure in any alternative medicine either. There are no definitions of cure, cures, curing, or cured in alternative medical references either.
If you want to cure your disease – you cannot cure it with medicines, you can only cure it with health.
to your health, tracy
Author: The Elements of Cure
