There are two inter-related movements arising within biomedical circles in response to this. One is the call for 'Integrated Medicine', the other for 'Evidence Based Medicine'. The superficial argument is that if a CAM can objectively be shown to work, it can or even should be absorbed within the mainstream. We have got to show that it works, how it works, and for which indications it works best. This typical argument begs many issues.
Mainstream medicine is practised within a specific paradigm.
Research is expected to adhere to orthodox assumptions, at which point the biomedical paradigm has already established its dominance. At a certain point, it is likely that the original paradigm will be abandoned, 'now that the technique has been put on a firm scientific footing'. These world views with their associated concepts are incommensurable from paradigm to paradigm. The richness, subtleties and insights of Chinese medicine must be lost if the biomedical paradigm is imposed upon it. A traditional holistic system will be replaced by something mechanistic, materialistic, and reductionist.