Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/899173
ATRON PROFILES PATRONS | Winter 2017 24 Graziadio Wellness Center in 2011 to offer a series of free lectures for the public and medical staff, centered on integrative medicine and mind-body wellness. e program would add weight to the hospital's existing offerings in mind-body healing techniques that included massage therapy, yoga, Pilates, Tai Chi, Reiki, meditation, stress management, and proper diet and nutrition. While their target audience was the community as a whole, an added objective was to open the minds of doctors and nurses who have direct influence over their patients. Following her introduction to the family, Vickie Hershberger, a health education instructor at Torrance Memorial with a master's degree in clinical holistic health education, was challenged to contain her excitement. "Many of the doctors and personnel at Torrance Memorial don't have a great depth of knowledge on the movement health care is making toward integrative medicine, and I'm not really in a position to educate them. So when I found out the Graziadio family had an interest in helping to inform the community about options in their healing, I was ecstatic," says Hershberger. "I love Alida. We share a passion for empowering people in their decision-making." She continues, "Working with the family gives me an opportunity to really use my skills and training. I get to investigate speakers they are interested in, and it has given me the opportunity to meet and work with leaders in the field." e practice of holistic medicine is often associated with eastern approaches that include acupuncture, herbs, supplements and meditation. Many western trained physicians are now using the term integrative medicine as the marriage of allopathic (western, evidence- based medicine) with holistic/complementary alternative medicine (CAM). As Stanley Tobias, MD, a retired Torrance rheumatologist who serves on the series' planning committee explains, allopathic medicine, which utilizes organ system diagnosis and emphasizes treatment with surgery and/or medications when indicated, has been the medical science norm. However the challenge, he says, is nothing is absolute. Dr. Tobias first began exploring eastern methods back in the 1960s, which led him to a 15-week course on acupuncture at UCLA. "When you treat complex chronic disease, the goal is to manage pain, increase function and allow for the best quality of life," Dr. Tobias says. "e best approach may be "When you treat complex chronic disease, the goal is to manage pain, increase function and allow for the best quality of life." Alida Calvillo and husband Stevan Calvillo (who serves on the Graziadio Wellness Center Advisory Commi ee and also the Torrance Memorial Founda on Board) are helping to spread the message about integra ve medicine and mind-body wellness to the medical community and greater South Bay area. Mary Lou Area, sibling of Alida and Louis and co-founder of the , Graziadio Wellness Center is currently living in Colorado. PHOTOGRAPHED BY PETER COOPER