When working with my clients I use an integrative and functional approach in order to correct imbalances to promote overall health and wellness.
But, what exactly does that mean?
Integrative medicine is defined as a holistic approach to healthcare that incorporates western and alternative forms of medicine to treat disease. This concept incorporates a whole person approach, including one’s spiritual, emotional, mental, and environmental wellness into the healing process. The patient and health care provider form a therapeutic partnership to identify, treat, and manage illness.
Functional medicine is an approach that focuses on why and how an illness occurred and then is treated based off the root cause versus traditional western techniques that occasionally overlooks the root cause to only manage the symptoms. Treatment usually involves a broad array of therapies including dietary interventions and lifestyle changes.
Integrative and functional nutrition incorporates both approaches and combines that with Medical Nutrition Therapy (MNT).
Why choose this approach against the alternative? Do you know someone who has spent thousands of dollars circling the healthcare system desperately searching for a diagnosis?
Someone who is prescribed multiple medications to manage an array of adverse symptoms, but later on developed new symptoms due to the long-term use of the original medication? Someone who was turned away because their physician could not identify the root cause of their pain?
This may be due to the standard American healthcare system that bases their recommendations of Western medicine and pharmaceutical companies.
Eastern medicine uses integrative and functional techniques to treat disease from the core and provides preventative care that involves all aspects of the body including immune and digestive health.
My personal recommendation is to find a health care professional who will focus on your overall health and go beyond just disease deduction. Someone who listens and trusts your concerns and who will not downplay your symptoms. Someone who uses both functional and traditional practices to help you feel better.