Pathways to Wellness

CONTACT:

1601 Washington Street. 3rd floor
Boston, MA 02118
617-859-3036
www.pathwaysboston.org

Demie Stathoplos, Executive Director

DESCRIPTION:

Pathways is home to the AIDS Care Project (ACP)—the largest public health clinic in the United States offering complementary therapies (acupuncture, Chinese herbal treatments, et al., approved by the Massachusetts Department of Health) to people living with HIV/AIDS. Since 1987, Pathways/ACP has improved its clients' quality of life by treating the often devastating side-effects (fatigue, neuropathy, gastro-intestinal distress) associated with the arduous medication protocols associated with HIV/AIDS. Within three months of treatments, the majority of patients experience a minimum of 50% reduction of those side-effects.

Based on this success, Pathways is working with some of the leading centers in the country (e.g., Boston University's School of Public Health, the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, the Joslyn Center for Diabetes) to develop treatment models and collaborative efforts that will extend these same holistic therapies to relieve the medication side effects of patients with chronic diseases like hepatitis, cancer, and diabetes. Today it operates one primary clinic and seven satellite locations throughout Massachusetts, treating 530 patients weekly (over 80,000 in Massachusetts since 1990!). It has trained over 500 acupuncturists and herbalists for the New England School of Acupuncture. Here is your opportunity to support a leader in complementary medicine.

(2002: HUMAN SERVICES: Health and Aging: General)