I 100% agree, and agree with you that it's a problem. I also think that a lot of what you have described your wife does isn't "alt medicine". It's just medicine. Midwifery isn't alt-medicine, it's just medicine. Bili Lights (while being something I had to look up before I could say anything about) also are just medicine. It works. Giving someone Oregano Oil to treat their depression is not medicine. Spending 90 minutes with them talking to them Is medicine, finding out how you can improve their lifestyle IS medicine. Time Line Therapy (tm) is not medicine. What we need are more Nurse Practitioners and GPs. The problem is that these are lower paid positions and if you just spent however many years in med school you probably don't want to be a GP. In Northern Ontario, the local medical school has a deal - We pay for you to go to school, you stay in Northern Ontario for X years (I forget. 5 maybe?). There is such a doctor shortage in the north that they needed to do it. Nurse practitioners are great - they can prescribe meds, they can do just about everything a GP can with a few restrictions. there are some procedures they can't do, for example. The best part about them, however, is that you don't need a doctorate - the NP program functions like a Masters degree plus Clinical. This means less training time and fewer barriers to getting people into health care fields. In my ideal scenario, someone like your wife would be qualified to be an NP or GP, with a practice focus on childbirth.Western medicine is crisis-oriented.