When was the last time you walked into a doctor’s office and walked out with a prescription for love, compassion and forgiveness?
That’s just what the doctor ordered — two famous doctors, actually, Deepak Chopra and Dean Ornish–at Thursday’s grand opening of the Chambers Center for Well Being in Morris Township.
Named for Newark philanthropist Ray Chambers and his family, the 20,000-square-foot facility is the new home for “integrative medicine” in the Atlantic Health System, parent organization of Morristown Medical Center.
From acupuncture to Zumba, the emphasis is on preventing or taming illness by marshaling the body’s natural defenses.
“This will change the world. And we’ll do it together with love and compassion,” Chopra said, after leading a brief meditation session for 240 invited hospital benefactors and medical staff.
Chopra, dubbed the “poet-prophet of alternative medicine” by Time magazine, and Ornish, a clinical researcher whose lifestyle program to reverse heart disease is covered by Medicare, each touted the power of attitudes and emotions to promote healing.
“The real epidemic,” beyond chronic illness from bad habits, “is loneliness, depression and isolation,” said Ornish, a familiar face to PBS viewers. Depression factors into the deaths of many patients recovering from heart conditions, he said. But that, too, can be reversed through smart changes in lifestyle, he contended.
Claims by Chopra, author of 21 New York Times fiction- and nonfiction best-sellers, are more controversial. Through meditation, yoga and Ayurvedic practices, he aspires to cheat Father Time.
Wryly, he explained: “I have committed myself now to reverse my aging, and to keep reversing it until I disappear…into an orgasm.” Donors and doctors roared with laughter in a tent outside the Chambers Center.
The center says it is the only place outside of Chopra’s own wellness center in California where people can enroll in his stress-reduction meditation programs, coming soon. The Dr. Dean Ornish Program for Reversing Heart Disease also is on the menu.
OPEN HOUSE, OPEN MINDS
Wellness programs are imperative not just for individual vitality, but also for the nation’s economic health, according to Dr. Mimi Guarnieri, medical adviser for the Chambers Center. America spends $2.5 trillion combating diabetes, high blood pressure and other preventable diseases, a figure that’s expected to nearly double by 2017, she said.
From 10 am to 1 pm on Oct. 11, 2014, visitors to 435 South St. can learn about center offerings that include acupuncture, energy therapies, massage, hypnosis, nutritional counseling and wellness coaching, along with certification programs for aspiring practitioners and medical professionals.
Genetic screening services may help clients tailor programs designed to help them avert conditions to which they are predisposed. Attention deficit disorder and other pediatric problems also can be addressed at the center.
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A two-hour consult with an “integrative medical physician” is $225. Courses range from $400 (stress reduction) to $1,875 (12-week “trim & fit” program). Gym membership is $400, plus $70 a month. A personal trainer is $70 for one visit, $1,200 for 20 sessions.
Classes on meditation, cooking, yoga, T’ai Chi, Jin Shin Jyutsu, Zumba and Singing Bowls start at $10 or $15 per session. A 120-seat conference room will host free monthly lectures, kicked off by Ornish on Oct. 10 at 9 am.
Some of the center’s 70 staffers and contractors will field questions at Saturday’s open house. The public can tour state-of-the art exam and treatment rooms, decorated in muted brown tones with soothing New Age music swirling from speakers above.
Guests can buy “medical grade” supplements from a small shop, along with Fair Trade sculptures and wellness books. The Luvo Cafe will serve gluten-free soups and wraps.
‘HOW GOOD CAN YOU REALLY FEEL?’
As Obamacare changes federal reimbursement rules for hospitals, rewarding those that rein in costly medical procedures, centers like this one seek a competitive edge with a formula of nutrition, stress reduction and exercise.
“Atlantic Health sees the future of health care moving to prevention and wellness. That’s the future of taking care of our community. We want to help people stay healthy and well,” said Emilie Rowan, director of the Chambers Center.
A former psychotherapist, Rowan saw the benefits of alternative treatments when her late father was in pain, dying from cancer.
“I worked with him on visualization and hypnosis. I know how meaningful it was– for me and for him–and I wanted to do more of it,” said Rowan, who used hypnosis to ease the pain of delivering her second child.
The center aims to replace the expression “what hurts you?” with “how good can you really feel?” said Karen Kessler, co-chair of its advisory board.
“Our patients will not receive their health information from Wikipedia. They will receive it from health professionals … that are trained in the science of health,” added Mimi Guarnieri, the center medical adviser, who came east from the Scripps Center for Integrative Medicine in La Jolla, CA.
The Chambers Center will rival Scripps as a world-class program, predicted Finn Wentworth, fundraising chair for Morristown Medical Center. More than $6 million of the $81 million raised so far has gone towards the Chambers Center, he said.
Still, integrative medicine is no panacea, cautioned the president of the hospital’s medical staff.
“I think it’s important not to look at it as a substitute, but as a complement to what we do day to day” in traditional medicine, said Dr. Steve Maser.
‘PROFOUND DIFFERENCE’
The idea for the center was hatched a quarter-century ago among friends over dinner at the former Pierre’s in Harding, said Ray Chambers.
“We said, ‘Why can’t we have a center here in Morristown where instead of just getting treatment, we could actually learn how to prevent illness, and learn different things from different parts of the world?'” recounted Chambers, who made his fortune doing leveraged buyouts of large companies.
The former co-owner of the New Jersey Devils was instrumental in getting the Prudential Center and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center built in Newark. Time ranked him among the world’s 100 most influential people of 2011. These days, much of his attention is focused on eradicating malaria, through a charity he co-founded.
At 72, Chambers also is participating in a control group for a study conducted by Chopra, his friend of 25 years.
“I was with Deepak a month ago, having every possible substance taken from me so he could study it,” he said.
That seven-day regimen — special diet, meditation, massages and measurements of the impact on one’s DNA — is coming to the new center, said Chambers, who has practiced meditation for years.
“It really makes a profound difference,” he said. “Not only physically, but mentally and emotionally.”
