More recently, maybe within the past couple of years there has been a shift in the way a doctor would prescribe medicine.  If you think back to the very start of the implementation of a doctor into a village or colony, they were very rarely the one to prescribe medicine. They would be the one to refer you a specialist who would be the only one to deal with the medicine of a patient. 

We now see a shift in medicine but yet again.  A doctor is more than likely the one to now refer a patient to other holistic approaches as opposed to prescribing medicine automatically.  With the decrease of insurance coverage rates, as well as patients ability to pay for prescription medicine, patients have turned to other solutions, ones that are more monetarily sensitive.  Even a doctor would be more inclined to offer alternative option to their patients, so as to reduce their costs.  We now even more likely to see a doctor more inclined to practice a specific medicine dealing with holistic measures of healing as opposed to one that is more interested in prescribing medicine. So the next time you visit your doctor, ask about new, less expensive holistic approaches.