Back Clinic Functional Medicine Team. Functional medicine is an evolution in the practice of medicine that better addresses the healthcare needs of the 21st century. By shifting the traditional disease-centered focus of medical practice to a more patient-centered approach, functional medicine addresses the whole person, not just an isolated set of symptoms.
Practitioners spend time with their patients, listening to their histories and looking at the interactions among genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors that can influence long-term health and complex, chronic disease. In this way, functional medicine supports the unique expression of health and vitality for each individual.
By changing the disease-centered focus of medical practice to this patient-centered approach, our physicians are able to support the healing process by viewing health and illness as part of a cycle in which all components of the human biological system interact dynamically with the environment. This process helps to seek and identify genetic, lifestyle, and environmental factors that may shift a person’s health from illness to well-being.
If you’re the kind of person who values optimal health, or simply if you don’t feel good and you wish to find the cause of the problem of while not being dependent on drugs and preventing chronic disease instead of just treating the symptoms, functional medicine is a perfect match for you.
What are functional medicine practitioners?
Functional medicine practitioners or doctors are trained to find the cause of medical issues. Functional medicine uses an in depth history as well as state of the art, cutting edge, innovative testing, along with an in depth understanding of human physiology, to uncover what has gone wrong in the individual’s body.
A functional medicine practitioner may be physician of any discipline. It is possible to find Naturopathic, Medical, Osteopathic and Chiropractic functional medicine doctors. These doctors are the type who aren’t happy with conventional treatment methods used to treat injuries or other types of conditions. Functional medicine doctors possess a passion to find the origin of the patients’ disease to provide overall health and wellness.
Understanding Functional Medicine
Functional medicine is a specialty which requires an unbelievable amount of advanced training. These doctors need to have a firm grasp on the basics of anatomy, biochemistry. Ongoing training is necessary to keep up with the ever-advancing testing. Instead of prescribing drugs for symptoms, these doctors work to get their patients well by repairing and discovering the cause of the issue.
Certified functional medicine training is available to physicians of all disciplines. A certified medication doctor must first pass a series of examinations and must complete about 200 hours of functional medicine training. Licensed functional medication doctors are current on the newest testing and therapy procedures. It you have a choice, get good care of a certified medicine practitioner to receive the best form of care and treatment.
Functional medicine treatment can be essential when treating a common problem like diabetes. When a patient goes to a standard physician, at best, they are given lifestyle and diet education and medication. Together with the disease every case of diabetes is treated exactly the same. The dilemma is that no two people are exactly the same. If everyone is different shouldn’t the treatment be unique for each individual?
After a comprehensive medical history of a patient with diabetes, for example, a testing strategy to figure out what was wrong and how to repair it so this patient could get well may be performed by the functional medicine practitioner. Doctors may often have to check just about every bodily fluid for a broad array of problems.
Functional medicine practitioner or doctors can help patients replenish their body together with the things it is deficient in and rid his body of toxins. How do you believe these health problems would have responded to the standard disease based therapy strategy of a prescription medicine? Drugs do not tackle toxicities and deficiencies, and too often they add toxicity and side effects that are unpleasant as well.
The biggest objection to functional medication is that insurance does not cover a lot of the treatment or testing. It’s true that functional medicine doctors can sometimes cost you more in the start. However, the standard medical approach is more costly in the end. Consider a patient in the setting of the above example. What happens to their kidneys or heart with medical therapy. How expensive is a heart attack, stroke, kidney dialysis or substitute, cancer, or Crohn’s disease?Healthcare specialists know it is always better and cheaper to correct a problem early on, and the sooner the better.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
Over the past five decades, many experienced and holistically experienced professionals have embraced “functional medicine” treatment concepts in dealing with the management of many commonly encountered chronic illnesses, including fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome and rheumatoid arthritis.
What are the functional medicine concepts for treatment?
This guide is an attempt to introduce, simplify, and summarize many of these seemingly complicated concepts for professionals who have just begun to use these notions, and for those professionals who have been hearing about this radical strategy and have been considering integrating these therapeutic approaches into their practices.
Integrating Functional Medicine Treatment Concepts
The medicine approach to the treatment of chronic disease is one that is based not on a single agent or modality as the solution that is palliative or curative. It’s holistically centered upon the principle that restoration of proper cell metabolism, through decreasing accumulative toxic load and oxidative stress to your system, enables normalization of mitochodrial respiration, cellular energy production, and ultimately causing a decrease in the signs and symptoms of chronic illness. More severe cases often require a broader functional approach, while many nutritionally-oriented physicians realize that supplements alone are beneficial for cases of chronic disease.
This functional medication philosophy and approach was initially developed for clinical use in chronic fatigue patients with excellent outcomes, and because of the commonality observed in many chronic conditions, it’s been used through the past few years in other disorders with great success, such as fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, along with auto-immune disorders. The seminal work of many in treating chronic fatigue syndrome has served as a template that is successful, and this method is currently utilized in the treatment of a broad range of chronic diseases.
Functional Medicine Treatment Explained
The functional medicine philosophy relies on the premise that a breakdown of the intestinal mucosa by the chronic intake of meals and lactic acid, and the usage of common over-the-counter and prescription drugs (such as antibiotics and NSAIDS), can result in dysbiosis and also a hyperpermeable intestinal mucosa, or leaky gut syndrome.
This hyperpermeablility can lead to the mucosa neglecting to act as a barrier, resulting in the crossing of radicals and partly digested food proteins through the intestinal mucosa and in the systemic blood source. The result is a rise in increased toxic loading and food allergies. This increased toxic load can lead to greater strain on the liver and its ability to adequately detoxify these substances. This may result in systemic tissue degeneration.
Greater tissue toxicity is thought to be a major cause for thyroid dysfunction, which results in a breakdown of the body’s cells, including the muscle cells, to dependant pathways. This accounts for the vast majority of ATP production. Reduced cellular ATP production may account for many (if not all) of the symptoms and signs associated with many chronic disease conditions, such as chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and fibromyalgia (FMS).
Increased intestinal permeability can result in partially digested substances entering the blood supply and behaving as antigens. The consequent antigen-antibody complexes seem to have an affinity for the synovium of articulations, This results in an inflammatory reaction in the joint linings commonly found in arthritidies like rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The main therapeutic agents used initially by standard medical physicians in the treatment of RA are (ironically) NSAIDs. NSAIDs, according to the PDR, result in increased intestinal permeability. Might it be possible that the traditional treatment for arthritidies has led to palliating the patient’s symptoms, while exacerbating the illness?
Focus of Functional Medicine Treatment Concepts
The functional medicine therapeutic approach is centered around correcting any intestinal dysbiosis fixing the mucosa, providing chemicals to the body reducing stress, and boosting a return of normal metabolism. Assessment begins by discovering intestinal health and also the functional reserve of the liver and its detoxification abilities.
This is commonly done with the help of individual symptom studies, like the a metabolic screening questionnaire and practical laboratory studies, such as the lactulose/mannitol challenge for assessing intestinal permeability, along with the entire digestive stool analysis (CDSA) for detecting markers of digestion, absorption, and colonic flora. Detoxification ability of the liver can be assessed through caffeine clearance and conjugation metabolite challenge test.. Conventional laboratories don’t perform these evaluations, but are available through specialized labs who offer functional testing.
Once the information is collected, a treatment system is chosen, which may consist of specific nutrients to fix any intestinal hyperpermeability (leaky gut syndrome). Individual nutrients like inulin, refined hypoallergenic rice proteins, pantothenic acid, and antioxidants can be utilized as a formulary medicinal food, which is usually much simpler and more practical to utilize scientifically. Digestion and absorption difficulties suggested on the CDSA can be treated together with all the temporary use of pancreatic enzymes and HCL (if indicated) in patients without gastritis or ulcers. Dysbiosis, a phrase used to describe an imbalance of colonic flora, can be addressed by the management of lactobacillus acidophilus and probiotics such as fructooligosaccharides (FOS).
In conclusion, any pathogenic bacteria, yeast, or parasites discovered on the CDSA should be treated with the prescription (or organic) agents suggested by the sensitivity tests on the CDSA. These could include nonprescription substances like garlic, citrus seed extract, berberine, artemisia, uva ursi, and others. Functional medicine approaches strive to holistically improve an individual’s overall health and wellness, which is why these treatment modalities have been applied to modern medical practices. Consult a professional regarding the best form of treatment for you.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
Even though the effects of overweight and obesity on diabetes, cardiovascular disease, all-cause mortality, and other health outcomes are widely known, there is less awareness that overweight, obesity, and weight gain are associated with an increased risk of certain cancers. A recent review of more than 1000 studies concluded that sufficient evidence existed to link weight gain, overweight, and obesity with 13 cancers, including adenocarcinoma of the esophagus; cancers of the gastric cardia, colon and rectum, liver, gallbladder, pancreas, corpus uteri, ovary, kidney, and thyroid; postmenopausal female breast cancer; meningioma; and multiple myeloma.1�An 18-year follow-up of almost 93?000 women in the Nurses� Health Study revealed a dose-response association of weight gain and obesity with several cancers.2
Obesity Increase
The prevalence of obesity in the United States has been increasing for almost 50 years. Currently, more than two-thirds of adults and almost one-third of children and adolescents are overweight or obese. Youths who are obese are more likely to be obese as adults, compounding their risk for health consequences such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. Trends in many of the health consequences of overweight and obesity (such as type 2 diabetes and coronary heart disease) also are increasing, coinciding with prior trends in rates of obesity. Furthermore, the sequelae of these diseases are related to the severity of obesity in a dose-response fashion.2�It is therefore not surprising that obesity accounts for a significant portion of health care costs.
Cancers
A report released on October 3, 2017, by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention assessed the incidence of the 13 cancers associated with overweight and obesity in 2014 and the trends in these cancers over the 10-year period from 2005 to 2014.3�In 2014, more than 630?000 people were diagnosed as having a cancer associated with overweight and obesity, comprising more than 55% of all cancers diagnosed among women and 24% of cancers among men. Most notable was the finding that cancers related to overweight and obesity were increasingly diagnosed among younger people.
From 2005 to 2014, there was a 1.4% annual increase in cancers related to overweight and obesity among individuals aged 20 to 49 years and a 0.4% increase in these cancers among individuals aged 50 to 64 years. For example, if cancer rates had stayed the same in 2014 as they were in 2005, there would have been 43?000 fewer cases of colorectal cancer but 33?000 more cases of other cancers related to overweight and obesity. Nearly half of all cancers in people younger than 65 years were associated with overweight and obesity. Overweight and obesity among younger people may exact a toll on individuals� health earlier in their lifetimes.2�Given the time lag between exposure to cancer risk factors and cancer diagnosis, the high prevalence of overweight and obesity among adults, children, and adolescents may forecast additional increases in the incidence of cancers related to overweight and obesity.
Clinical Intervention
Since the release of the landmark 1964 surgeon general�s report on the health consequences of smoking, clinicians have counseled their patients to avoid tobacco and on methods to quit and provided referrals to effective programs to reduce their risk of chronic diseases including cancer. These efforts, coupled with comprehensive public health and policy approaches to reduce tobacco use, have been effective�cigarette smoking is at an all-time low. Similar efforts are warranted to prevent excessive weight gain and treat children, adolescents, and adults who are overweight or obese. Clinician referral to intense, multicomponent behavioral intervention programs to help patients with obesity lose weight can be an important starting point in improving a patient�s health and preventing diseases associatedwith obesity. The benefits of maintaining a healthy weight throughout life include improvements in a wide variety of health outcomes, including cancer. There is emerging but very preliminary data that some of these cancer benefits may be achieved following weight loss among people with overweight or obesity.4
The US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF)
The US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommends screening for obesity and intensive behavioral interventions delivered over 12 to 16 visits for adults and 26 or more visits for children and adolescents with obesity.5,6�Measuring patients� weight, height, and body mass index (BMI), consistent with USPSTF recommendations, and counseling patients about maintaining a healthy weight can establish a foundation for preventive care in clinical care settings. Scientific data continue to emerge about the negative health effects of weight gain, including an increased risk of cancer.1�Tracking patients� weight over time can identify those who could benefit from counseling and referral early and help them avoid additional weight gain. Yet less than half of primary care physicians regularly assess the BMI of their adult, child, and adolescent patients. Encouraging discussions about weight management in multiple health care settings, including physicians� offices, clinics, emergency departments, and hospitals, can provide multiple opportunities for patients and reinforce messages across contexts and care environments.
Weight Loss Programs
Implementation of clinical interventions, including screening, counseling, and referral, has major challenges. Since 2011, Medicare has covered behavioral counseling sessions for weight loss in primary care settings. However, the benefit has not been widely utilized.7�Whether the lack of utilization is a consequence of lack of clinician or patient knowledge or for other reasons remains uncertain. Few medical schools and residency programs provide adequate training in prevention and management of obesity or in understanding how to make referrals to such services. Obesity is a highly stigmatized condition; many clinicians find it difficult to initiate a conversation about obesity with patients, and some may inadvertently use alienating language when they do. Studies indicate that patients with obesity prefer the use of terms such as�unhealthy weight�or�increased BMI�rather than�overweight�or�obesity�and�improved nutrition and physical activity�rather than�diet and exercise.8�However, it is unknown if switching to these terms will lead to more effective behavioral counseling. Effective clinical decision support tools to measure BMI and guide physicians through referral and counseling interventions can provide clinicians needed support within the patient-clinician encounter. Inclusion of recently developed competencies for prevention and management of obesity into the curricula of health care professionals may improve their ability to deliver effective care. Because few primary care clinicians are trained in behavior change strategies like cognitive behavioral therapy or motivational interviewing, other trained health care professionals, such as nurses, pharmacists, psychologists, and dietitians could assist by providing counseling and appropriate referrals and help people manage their own health.
Achieving sustainable weight loss requires comprehensive strategies that support patients� efforts to make significant lifestyle changes. The availability of clinical and community programs and services to which to refer patients is critically important. Although such programs are available in some communities, there are gaps in availability. Furthermore, even when these programs are available, enhancing linkages between clinical and community care could improve patients� access. Linking community obesity prevention, weight management, and physical activity programs with clinical services can connect people to valuable prevention and intervention resources in the communities where they live, work, and play. Such linkages can give individuals the encouragement they need for the lifestyle changes that maintain or improve their health.
The high prevalence of overweight and obesity in the United States will continue to contribute to increases in health consequences related to obesity, including cancer. Nonetheless, cancer is not inevitable; it is possible that many cancers related to overweight and obesity could be prevented, and physicians have an important responsibility in educating patients and supporting patients� efforts to lead healthy lifestyles. It is important for all health care professionals to emphasize that along with quitting or avoiding tobacco, achieving and maintaining a healthy weight are also important for reducing the risk of cancer.
Corresponding Author:�Greta M. Massetti, PhD, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 4770 Buford Hwy NE, Atlanta, GA 30341 (gmassetti@cdc.gov).
Conflict of Interest Disclosures:�All authors have completed and submitted the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflict of Interest. Dr Dietz reports receipt of scientific advisory board fees from Weight Watchers and consulting fees from RTI. No other disclosures were reported.
Disclaimer:�The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors and not necessarily the official position of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
References
1. Lauby-Secretan B, Scoccianti C, Loomis D, Grosse Y, Bianchini F, Straif K; International Agency for Research on Cancer Handbook Working Group. Body fatness and cancer�viewpoint of the IARC Working Group. N Engl J Med. 2016;375(8):794-798. PubMedArticle
2. Zheng Y, Manson JE, Yuan C, et al. Associations of weight gain from early to middle adulthood with major health outcomes later in life. JAMA. 2017;318(3):255-269. PubMedArticle
4. Byers T, Sedjo RL. Does intentional weight loss reduce cancer risk? Diabetes Obes Metab. 2011;13(12):1063-1072. PubMedArticle
5. Grossman DC, Bibbins-Domingo K, Curry SJ, et al; US Preventive Services Task Force. Screening for obesity in children and adolescents: US Preventive Services Task Force recommendation statement. JAMA. 2017;317(23):2417-2426. PubMedArticle
7. Batsis JA, Bynum JPW. Uptake of the centers for Medicare and Medicaid obesity benefit: 2012-2013. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2016;24(9):1983-1988. PubMedArticle
8. Puhl R, Peterson JL, Luedicke J. Motivating or stigmatizing? public perceptions of weight-related language used by health providers. Int J Obes (Lond). 2013;37(4):612-619. PubMedArticle
You’ve perhaps heard of functional medicine, the medical care strategy that requires a “systems” perspective of health by focusing on the sources of dysfunction in the body as well as also the interactions among genetic, environmental and lifestyle factors. Functional nutrition fits within this framework to analyze how food “functions” inside our own bodies to both provide nourishment but also to influence the body’s health (or disease) itself.
Beyond basic fuel, how does food help generate health each day?
Food is one of the most basic and potent inputs we provide our bodies, a clear and impactful message to our biochemistry. It’s one of several links between our internal and external environments. More than two thousand decades ago, the Greek physician Hippocrates offered the famous quote, “Let medicine be thy food and thy food be thy medicine.” Now it is a rallying cry for supporters of food nourishment. What should this mean for you?
Nutrition as a Part of Functional Medicine
If it comes to health care, too often we put energy, time and cash. We’ll never envision optimal health and well-being at this route. When we get to the underlying causes of our physical dysfunction (e.g. insulin resistance, high blood pressure, inflammatory conditions), we suddenly gain a panoramic view of what feeds (sometimes actually speaking) our dysfunction and that which, consequently, can nourish or excite it toward optimal operation.
Functional nutrition at its best both examines the balance of our personal dietary landscape to see how well we’re nourishing our bodies’ needs and targets specific foods that might have especially potent impact to tackle the delicate and not-so-subtle dysfunctions that we harbor.
As an example, if you have an inflammatory condition or your blood markers reveal higher than normal inflammatory amounts, you will not only need to be sure to steer clear of inflammation-promoting foods but also make the most of this anti-inflammatory effectiveness of certain foods (e.g. turmeric, omega-3’s found in fatty fish and caliber omega nutritional supplements, cruciferous vegetables, berries, etc.). Functional nutrition emphasizes that specific decisions can function to your own personal benefit and that your nutrition should get the job done for you.
Goals of Functional Nutrition
Functional nutrition should enhance your health status, improve vitality, satiety, and ability to heal from injury or illness. When our choices start to include fresh, fibrous, and minimally processed foods, our dietary patterns start to work in our favor in many respects when compared to diets of highly-processed, nutrient-poor foods. From there, proper individualized recommendations might help us incorporate targeted/therapeutic food choices that are additional.
Functional nutrition should foster resilience in spite of numerous challenges we experience as we age and accumulate stresses (i.e. physical and psychological decline, sleep deprivation, various kinds of psychological distress). Age-related functional decline is an inevitable part of the human life cycle. In the last few generations we’ve seen some of the biggest gains in average population life expectancy along with the fastest increases in debilitating chronic disease observed. For people to satisfy their quests to live a ‘better-than-average’ lifetime, they must stay more resilient than ever in the surface of the multiple stressors modern life gifts. Quality nutrition helps us avoid these conditions, and Practical Nutrition guidance/therapy can help us manage them or dial them back if we affected.
Maybe most powerful, comprehending functional nutrition can help us realign our relationship with food. When we think about food as medicine, our paradigm on eating may change. We can better appreciate the impact of our daily choices. We can examine the backdrop of these options with a different view we make the decisions we do. The range broadens to real life program, how functional nutrition can fit inside our lifestyle performance.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
Dietitians at Integrative and Functional Medicine (DIFM) is a specialty clinic group of nutrition professionals whose center philosophy centers around a holistic, personalized approach to healing and health. Members incorporate many different nutrition remedies such as brain/body modalities in clinical practice supplements and whole foods.
How is nutrition a part of integrative and functional medicine?
Integrative medicine is the practice of medicine that reaffirms the value of the connection between professional and patient, focuses on the entire individual, is informed by evidence, and makes use of all appropriate therapeutic approaches, healthcare professionals, and areas to achieve optimal health and healing.
Functional medicine addresses the underlying causes of illness utilizing a systems-oriented approach and engaging both practitioner and patient at a healing partnership. Functional medicine involves understanding complex, chronic disease’s origins, prevention, and therapy. Hallmarks of a functional medicine approach include:
Patient-centered care. The focus of functional medicine is on care boosting health beyond the absence of illness; as a positive energy. By listening to the patient and studying his or her narrative, the practitioner tailors treatments that address the unique needs of the individual and brings the individual relief.
An integrative, science-based health care strategy. Functional medicine professionals seem “upstream” to think about the intricate web of interactions in the individual’s history, physiology, and lifestyle that can cause disease. The distinctive genetic makeup of each individual is considered, combined with both internal (brain, body, and soul) and external (physical and social environment) variables that affect overall functioning.
Integrating best medical clinics. Functional medicine integrates traditional Western medical practices with what is sometimes regarded as “choice” or “integrative” medicine, creating a focus on prevention through nutrition, diet, and exercise; use of the latest diagnostic techniques; and prescribed combinations of drugs and/or botanical medicines, supplements, therapeutic diets, detoxification programs, or stress-management practices.
Functional Medicine and Nutrition
Functional medication has, for years, been the promoters and teachers of using food as medicine. According to the Institute for Functional Medicine, “functional nutrition highlights the value of top quality meals and phytonutrient diversity to deal with clinical imbalances and move people toward the maximum expression of health. Advanced nutrition evaluation and a comprehensive functional medicine based history leads to a personalized therapeutic intervention made to promote optimal health and protect against diet- and lifestyle-related disease.”
Integrative and functional medicine nutritionists have been uniquely trained and have many years of experience incorporating the art and science of integrative and functional nutrition treatment. They understand that giving you a standard diet plan based on a diagnosis is just not enough to foster optimum recovery. After all, one size does not fit all and they strive to provide the maximum quality of individualized nutrition care to all of our patients.
Practice-Based Evidence for Nutrition
Practice-based evidence promotes the worth of their wisdom and evidence gained by the professional’s clinical observations and experiences. The Dietitians in the Integrative and Functional Medicine (DIFM) practice group of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics has developed Standards of Practice (SOP) and Standards of Professional Performance (SOPP) in Integrative and Functional Medicine. The SOP addresses the Nutrition Care Process (NCP) and actions related to person-centered care. The SOPP are statements that describe a level of behaviour in the role.
The Integrative and Functional Medicine Nutrition Therapy (IFMNT) Radial was established within an integrated conceptual framework to assist in IFMNT practice. The structure of this IFMNT Radial allows for the analysis of interrelationships and interactions. The Radial depicts that food is still a source of information that affects, and is influenced by, the five areas also as a factor in disease and health.
The five key areas include: lifestyle, systems (signs and symptoms), heart imbalances, metabolic pathways, and biomarkers. Surrounding the Radial are currently precipitating. The SOP, at the June 2011 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, is along with the IFMNT Radial.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
“The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will teach his patient in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease”. These wise words were uttered by Thomas Edison more than a hundred years back at the start of the 20th century, the century which could become the conventional system’s expansion we know today regarding alternative treatment options and functional medicine.
What is the future of health care?
The past century has been in many ways an entire departure from Edison’s words. Away from looking at the foods we eat and prevention and toward the Big Pharma, sick care system: diagnose a disease and match it with a corresponding drug. Despite spending more on healthcare than the next 10 top-spending nations combined, the U.S. has the most persistent illness cases and shortest life span of all industrialized nations.
In accordance with a comprehensive study by the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council, American men rated last in life expectancy, and women were ranked second to last. When it comes to the health of a pregnant mother or her child, the U.S. has the maximum mortality rate among all developed countries. The U.S. also has the third-worst mortality rate from nutritional deficiencies, and also the greatest total age-adjusted mortality rate among all developed nations.
Despite the wonderful progress in life saving surgeries and emergency care, when it comes to chronic health ailments and longevity, we are doing something abysmally wrong. Seeing the shadow surrounding the medical care system, functional medicine has been attempting to supply a solution to this issue.
Yet even today, a lot of people don’t fully comprehend what functional medicine is, or why they need to try it. Well, here are six compelling reasons to give functional medicine a try.
Functional Medicine Interprets Results Differently
On your labs there is typically a reference range that tells you what’s considered “normal.” Anything out of this reference array is typically labeled as “high” or “low” in bold font. A statistical bell curve typical of that specific lab’s populace determines that reference range.
If your laboratory is one number away from being out of the benchmark range, you’re still categorized as “normal.” But disease doesn’t start as soon as you’re out of that diagnostic range. Unfortunately, this means you’re either, trending toward disorder, outside of the benchmark array, or you’re trending toward health.
There are a whole lot of people who go to a healthcare professiona, only to discover why they are struggling with health issues, and their labs return “normal.” They leave without any answers or remedies and’re told there is not anything wrong with them. A medication lab analysis sheds light on unanswered health concerns that fall through the cracks of the standard model of maintenance.
Functional Medicine Provides More Diagnostics
In addition to interpreting the labs that mainstream medical professionals run, functional medicine goes past the label of this disease to check out the full extent of a patient’s physiology. So that it can be paired with a pharmaceutical drug, typically a disease is diagnosed by the labs at the standard model of care. They’re very incomplete from a functional medicine perspective, although the labs your doctor runs are adequate if he is prescribing medications.
Comprehensive labs to examine underlying deficiencies, imbalances, infections and dysfunctions, give excellent insight into these frequently overlooked portions of your health issues.
Functional Medicine Customizes Healthcare
As soon as you’re tagged with a disorder in mainstream medicine, you are given the very same medications everyone else with this disease is given. This cookie cutter strategy works occasionally, but more often than not, it fails miserably. Medication takes into account that we designed a bit differently, so what works for one person may not always be right for you. A detailed health plan that is tailored addresses that you are seeing results.
Functional Medicine and Patients
Mainstream medicine is really bogged down with symptom care. That is why every six months you wait an hour at your physician’s office for a regular visit. This system is failing millions of Americans suffering from chronic health conditions.
In terms of crisis care, emergencies and surgeries, we have among the very best health care systems in the world, but in regards to chronic healthcare, the U.S. is still one of the worst industrialized health care systems in the world.
Functional Medicine and Addressing Dysfunctions
While mainstream medicine is structured to manage symptoms, functional medicine is primarily concerned with addressing the underlying dysfunctions of the body that give rise to symptoms. If someone has high blood sugar, he’s typically medicines that stimulate the pancreas to produce more insulin, which attracts down the blood sugar.
Functional medication asks why a patient has high blood glucose in the first place. Very rarely is somebody sick from a medication deficiency. They may have cellular insulin resistance, brain-adrenal axis dysfunctions causing cortisol along with a gut disease leading to their own blood sugar dis-balance.
In this example there is nothing actually wrong with the pancreas, therefore while the medicine will make their blood sugar numbers seem nicer on a laboratory, it does not address the reasons they’re high in the first place. So functional medicine may be the missing link to getting healthy and getting off drugs and medications.
Remedies Are Essential in Functional Medicine
Functional medicine is not anti-medication, however, practitioners may ask what the individual’s most effective alternative is, and that which causes the fewest side effects. It’s maybe the smartest choice, if a drug fits that criteria. However, it often is not.
Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, said tens of thousands of years back, “Let food be thy medicine, and medicine thy food,” and practical medication agrees. Food is used as medicine in a state specific manner. Herbal and micronutrient medicines are used to address the dysfunctions found on the labs to encourage healthy function.
It’s important to not forget, though, that even with natural choices and foods, what works for one person might not work for the next. We need to tailor the program for the individual instead of being the alternative model of mainstream medicine, using its magical pills and “one-size-fits-all” approach.
This new era of evidence-based all-natural health care is providing hope for all. As a result of new technologies, webcam consultations with people give the exceptional opportunity to share functional medicine. Edison’s words are coming true. Let the future begin.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
Chronic pain can pose many problems. Traditional medicine delivers a broad selection of treatment options, some more powerful than others. And these choices have a wide spectrum of benefits which may not always be best for everyone.
Should you consider alternative treatments for chronic pain?
There are a variety of traditional medicine treatments and procedures for treating chronic pain. For many pain management specialists, treatment may include steroid injections to decrease inflammation. For others, treatment might suggest procedures, such as narcotics, drugs or medications, to reduce the pain signals.
But, these remedies are only designed to temporarily relieve the symptom of pain. You must return again in a couple of weeks for one more prescription or shot refill. While these remedies can be effective at pain management,they also carry effects that can display as adverse effects to the patient
Common pain control drugs such as oxycodone and hydrocodone are known to have long-term unwanted side effects. Most commonly we think of this extremely addictive nature of the drugs, and our body becomes determined by the drugs to operate without pain. Research has also confirmed the cost that these drugs take in your liver and endocrine system. Levels are disrupted that can start a domino effect that disrupts you mood, metabolism, sleep, and sexual role, among other things. When these types of treatments are not preferred, other treatments should be considered.
How Functional Medicine Differs from Traditional Medicine
Functional medicine has proven tremendously effective at combating chronic pain because of its main focus: Concentrate on the underlying cause, instead of just masking the symptom.
When using medications to dull or numb pain, effectively you are disrupting the signals being transmitted to your brain so that your brain doesn’t feel the pain. But instead of numbing the pain, functional medicine focuses first on determining the source of the individual’s painful symptoms.
Functional Medicine doctors work with patients everyday who deal with chronic pain on a regular basis. Many of these patients believed that they would devote the rest of their lives on tablets and injections and surgical processes to temporarily alleviate the pain. When it is a patient who’s dealing with arthritis, that is truly an autoimmune illness, or somebody who is recovering from an auto accident and has been through numerous surgeries, functional medicine includes a regimen of non-invasive treatments that heal you from the inside out.
At precisely the exact same time, it has been recognized that there’s a time and place for more advanced medical care that may require invasive processes. This should not be your first plan of action.
Allow qualified and experienced healthcare professionals to design a customized program that unites their foundational understanding of chiropractic care together with the quickly-developing research behind functional medicine. Understanding how your system integrates with other body systems is the secret so that you can simply live pain free, breaking free from the cycle of chronic pain and find proper pain management treatments.
The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic and spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss options on the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
By Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Wellness
Overall health and wellness are essential towards maintaining the proper mental and physical balance in the body. From eating a balanced nutrition as well as exercising and participating in physical activities, to sleeping a healthy amount of time on a regular basis, following the best health and wellness tips can ultimately help maintain overall well-being. Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables can go a long way towards helping people become healthy.
IFM's Find A Practitioner tool is the largest referral network in Functional Medicine, created to help patients locate Functional Medicine practitioners anywhere in the world. IFM Certified Practitioners are listed first in the search results, given their extensive education in Functional Medicine
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