The IPMT has been organised since 2001 as a series of annual further training weeks at international level. As part of this further training, it is possible as a registered physician to obtain the certificate as an anthroposophical physician after five years. In addition to attending five weeks of further training, evidence of at least two years of work with a specialist mentor must be provided, as well as a written project assignment and three case studies. The IPMT is meanwhile also open and in great demand as a further training opportunity for the various therapeutic professions as well as for nursing staff and pharmacists. Certification is possible also for these professional groups.
The structure of the IPMT modules typically involves the morning being primarily for practice, the afternoon being devoted to subject-specific work in workshops, and questions of medical ethics being discussed in the evening.
On each morning of an IPMT week, the participants complete a three-step process in which, after a joint movement unit (eurythmy or Bothmer® gymnastics), they turn to Goethean phenomenonological work and text work in small groups. This structure of "movement – encounter – comprehension" attempts to stimulate soul and spiritual activity and receptivity in the whole human being, which forms the basis for the anthroposophical medical work in the afternoon.
In the afternoon sessions, too, the focus is on skills development, but now at a diagnostic and therapeutic level: cases from actual practice are discussed with colleagues and used to establish the action of the human constitutional elements in various diseases. Based on this, treatment is devised that includes external applications, eurythmy therapy, art and talking therapies and other therapeutic options in addition to medicinal treatment.
In the evening, aspects of meditative training, self-education and professional ethics are developed in close alignment with participants' specific questions. How can what we have jointly ascertained and found to be correct become a medical and therapeutic disposition that is guided by what is appropriate for human beings and in keeping with human dignity?
The IPMT has now been held in more than 25 countries and has guided several hundred physicians, therapists, nurses and pharmacists to certification. Following on from the IPMT, anthroposophical medical associations have been founded in numerous countries to campaign for the availability of medicines and to promote the legal integration and public recognition of Anthroposophic Medicine in their countries.
International Coordination IPMT
Stefan Langhammer
stefan.langhammer@medsektion-goetheanum.ch
https://ipmt.medsektion-goetheanum.org/termine