As a Naturopathic Doctors, we incorporate the 6 Naturopathic Principles to support the body's own ability to heal rather than a temporary fix in symptoms and/or disease process.
- Do No Harm: utilizing the most natural, least invasive and least toxic therapies
- Identify & Treat the Cause: comprehensive and speciality lab testing to look beyond the symptoms to the underlying cause
- Treat the Whole Person: view the body as an integrated whole in all its physical and spiritual dimension
- The Healing Power of Nature: trust the body's inherent wisdom to heal itself
- Physician as Teacher: educate the steps to achieving and maintaining optimal health
- Prevention: focus on overall health, wellness and disease prevention
Image copyright aanmc.org
What Is A Naturopathic Doctor?
Licensed naturopathic doctors (NMDs) are regulated at the state level to practice naturopathic medicine.
Naturopathic medical students attend accredited, four-year, in-residence naturopathic medical schools where they study biomedical sciences such as anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, pathology, and pharmacology.
Their medical education incorporates the latest scientific advances and natural approaches to illness prevention and management.
Students complete at least 4,100 hours of class and clinical training, including over 1,200 hours of hands-on, supervised clinical training. That's a lot of training!
NMDs are also evaluated on diagnostics, treatment modalities (nutrition, physical medicine, psychology, pharmacology), and medical interventions.
What does this mean for patients? A licensed NMD has fantastic tools in their medical toolbox to optimize health, address the root cause of health problems, prevent disease, and revolutionize your wellness.
Why Choose A Naturopathic Medical Doctor
Why do people seek out the care of a licensed naturopathic doctor (NMD)?
1. Optimal Health
Some patients are looking for optimal health - not just “normal” lab values or merely the absence of disease. NMDs are trained to treat the whole person. This requires taking the time to listen and understand the genetic, environmental, and behavioral/lifestyle factors that can affect your health.
2. Not One-Size-Fits-All Treatment
NMDs understand there is no one-size-fits-all treatment that works for everybody. After your visit with an NMD, you’ll leave the doctor’s office with a treatment plan uniquely tailored to you, your health status, your health goals, and your lifestyle.
3. Finding The Root Cause of Chronic Problems
Sometimes sleep problems, aches and pains, difficult skin rashes, and stomach discomfort are symptoms of an underlying illness. While these symptoms can be managed, it’s more important to understand and treat the root cause—which is the focus of naturopathic medicine.
4. Learn To Actively Managing Own Health
An NMD will help you learn what your body needs to get well and stay healthy. Patients have the opportunity to feel empowered and hopeful when they are actively engaged in managing their own health.
5. Chronic Pain
Pain that lasts six months or more is more complex than acute pain and requires a holistic, long-term approach. NMDs are trained to determine which combination of therapies may work best to heal or manage your pain safely so that you can resume daily activities.
6. Conditions Difficult to Diagnose
Certain chronic health conditions with symptoms like fatigue, insomnia, or gastrointestinal distress can be difficult to diagnose and treat. NMDs use diagnostic tools common in conventional medicine (detailed health histories and targeted laboratory testing/imaging, etc.), but are also trained in holistic approaches for when those methods do not get to the root of the issue. These approaches can open doors to new treatment pathways and options.
The Theraputic Order
The Therapeutic Order is a set of guidelines to help physicians follow the philosophical principles. The goal of treatment is to completely resolve the patient’s symptoms and address the underlying cause while using the least force possible.
Think of a food pyramid, but treatment based! ND’s start at the bottom and guess what the foundation is?? Identifying and removing the obstacles to cure and assessing the determinants of health. We do this by addressing your body’s environment. We must create a healthy environment to ensure optimal health. That’s why we start with addressing and implementing lifestyle and diet changes. Can it really be that simple? YES!
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
Oftentimes when patients come to see me, they are already mid-way up this ladder and haven’t addressed the foundation. That’s where I will start. Addressing the ROOT CAUSE.
Image copyright aanmc.org
Benefits of Choosing a Naturopathic Medical Doctor
Half of all Americans live with at least one chronic disease, like heart disease or diabetes. But among US adults, 70-90% of common chronic diseases are potentially preventable by modifiable lifestyle changes.
Licensed naturopathic doctors (NMDs) proactively focus on prevention both to benefit individual patients and to improve public health.
Beyond reactively treating disease, naturopathic doctors emphasize and help individuals build optimal health by:
- Spending extra time with patients to identify the determinants of health and disease
- Approaching health through the lens of the whole person—body, mind, and spirit
- Educating about and promoting healthy lifestyle choices
- Assessing and addressing risk factors and implementing early interventions
- Determining genetic and hereditary susceptibility to disease
- Evaluating and addressing environmental and other external impacts on health
- Determining the impact of social relationships and community on health, and working to improve them, when relevant
The right preventive care at every stage of life helps Americans stay healthy, avoid or delay the onset of disease, and keep diseases they already have from becoming worse or debilitating.
If you're ready to schedule an appointment, contact me and I'll help you choose the best appointment for you!