Bridging Old Wisdom and New Science: Communicating the Journey from Remedy to Therapy

Welcome, reader!

From plant-based decoctions to gene-edited therapies, humanity’s approach to healing has always been a story of translation—translating lived experience into remedies, remedies into research, and research into structured therapies. Today, healthtech and biotech teams face a similar challenge: how to communicate the lineage of knowledge in ways that honor tradition, yet also meet the rigor of modern evidence.

This newsletter explores how we can bridge cultural wisdom and contemporary science—through design, narrative, and digital platforms that make the journey from remedy to therapy both credible and compelling.

Featured Insight: The Continuum of Care Stories

“Remedy” suggests a local, intuitive, often community-driven approach to healing. “Therapy,” by contrast, reflects a tested, standardized intervention, often carried forward within health systems. But between these poles lies a critical communication space: how do we responsibly narrate the transition from folk knowledge to peer-reviewed intervention?

• In biotech and medtech, this means contextualizing novel therapies (e.g., CRISPR-based solutions, microbiome therapies) with cultural origins of knowledge and vice versa.

• For communicators, it means avoiding both “romanticization” and “sterilization” of traditional knowledge. The sweet spot: making visible the lineage of insight while clarifying the rigor of modern validation.

Innovation Showcase: GPTs in Translational Storytelling

Custom GPTs are emerging as bridge-builders in knowledge translation. Examples include:

• TCM-GPT - an LLM tailored to the unique terminology and diagnostic concepts of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) (Source)

• IRGPT - being developed to assist with Ayurvedic consultations in different Indian languages. (Source)

• Drug Discovery Assistants – used to parse ethnobotanical databases, connecting traditional plant remedies to molecular leads in modern pipelines. An example can be found here.

Practical Tools

• The EthnoMed Database (University of Washington) – Provides cultural profiles and medical notes to help clinicians contextualize care.

• NAPRALERT (UIC College of Pharmacy) – A global database of ethnobotanical, pharmacological, and chemical literature on natural products, invaluable for tracing remedies into molecular leads.

• WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy 2014–2023 – A framework for integrating traditional medicine into health systems responsibly.

• Connected Papers – Visualizes how early observational studies connect to modern peer-reviewed research, great for mapping evidence trails.

• Scite – Tracks how research has been cited (supporting, contrasting, or mentioning), helping you see how remedy-based insights evolve into validated therapies.

• Europe PMC Text Mining Tools – Offers AI-driven discovery across millions of articles, useful for spotting transitions from ethnomedicine to therapeutic trials.

Try This: Choose a therapy relevant to your work, search it in NAPRALERT or Europe PMC, and then use Connected Papers to map its publication journey. The visual trail often reveals hidden stages between cultural knowledge and regulatory adoption.

From the Field

Case in Point: Artemisinin, the Nobel-winning malaria drug, emerged from Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). The critical communication work was not just in isolating the compound, but in narrating its journey to global health authorities in a way that honored its origins and validated its efficacy.

"The remedy was known for centuries; the therapy changed millions of lives." – adapted from Nobel committee commentary

Source: Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine 2015 announcement

Behind the Scenes

When science communicators draft white papers or patient guides, the biggest pitfall is flattening the origin story. Teams often scrub cultural references out of fear of appearing “unscientific.” But omission can alienate communities and weaken trust. Instead:

• Frame origins as hypotheses, not proofs.

• Show respect for cultural knowledge keepers.

• Use visuals (timelines, flow diagrams) to clarify where evidence standards shift.

At SciRio, we work with a range of organisations whose research work stem from ancient knowledge. As science communicators it has been our role to understand the original context and identify clinically relevant scientific that can bridge the traditional knowledge and evidence-based approaches. How we put across the messaging can be very crucial to the interpretation of the science behind the traditional knowledge, and how the audience perception would drive the industry and research.

Community Corner

Question for You: What’s one “remedy-to-therapy” story in your field that deserves better communication?

Reply and we’ll feature a few in the next issue—with visuals that honor both the science and the story.

Missed the last issue? Read it here.

Subscriber Bonus

Worksheet: Mapping the Remedy-to-Therapy Journey

This edition’s bonus is a guided worksheet you can adapt for your projects, team workshops, or client presentations. It helps you chart the evolution of a therapy from cultural remedy to clinical adoption.

Download the worksheet from here

Final Word

Bridging old wisdom and new science isn’t just about molecules—it’s about communication. By carefully narrating the journey from remedy to therapy, biotech and medtech teams can honor origins, reinforce credibility, and inspire trust in innovation.

Next time you introduce a therapy, ask: What’s the remedy story behind it, and how can we communicate that journey responsibly?