Are chronic health problems keep you from living your best life? Chronic illnesses may bring symptoms like pain, fatigue and mood disorders. Pain and fatigue may become a frequent part of your day as a result of your chronic health issue. You do not have to suffer!
Traditionally, western medicine treats symptoms and diseases through differential diagnosis. It is a systematic procedure where the physician begins by observing the patient's symptoms, examining the patient, and taking the patient's personal and family history.
The most likely causes of the symptoms are listed as possibilities. The physician will ask questions and perform tests to eliminate possibilities until he or she is satisfied that the "single most likely cause" has been identified. A diagnosis is made, and treatment is prescribed.
For example, if a patient has an acid stomach, antacids are given. If the gallbladder is causing pain, it is taken out. If the sinuses are congested, antihistamines and decongestants are prescribed. If that doesn't help, the sinuses are scraped. Inhalers and steroids are given to control asthma.
However, the question remains, "What is the cause?"
If one is unable to determine the cause, patients are doomed to a life which, at best, consists of symptom management, with no hope for complete healing.
Everyday people are diagnosed with some horrific disease. Without minimizing the severity of the diagnosis, you can ask, "What is the cause?" An active parent and work professional suffers from chronic depression. Depression is the symptom as well as the diagnosis. Yet, what's the cause? A child cannot sit still or focus in school. Grades are very poor. The child has been diagnosed with ADHD. Lack of focus and concentration, along with a lack of ability to be still are all symptoms. What's the cause?
Case studies have shown that no disease is an entity by itself. The cause may be a complex combination of any number of things including nerve interference, poor nutrition, chemicals, food additives, pesticides in food, water, and air, an abnormal lifestyle, stress, abuse, loss, and other physical and emotional "hits" taken over a lifetime.
Symptoms due to these issues are not necessarily noticed right away because the body has been created with many systems, organs, and glands, each with multiple backups in place. When one organ is not functioning optimally, the backup organ has to work harder to compensate.
For example, if the right kidney is diseased, the left kidney must function to a greater degree. As the primary organ regains function, the backup can return to its state of ease. If any of the backup systems, organs or glands has to work overtime for long periods of time, they will tire and lose optimal function. Each time any part of the body is not functioning optimally, symptoms occur.
Unfortunately, people are typically more in tune with what is and what is not working in their home than in their own body. Minor symptoms are self-treated with over-the-counter medications and nutrition, and the cause is ignored. The energy problem remains undiscovered. It is only when the symptoms become unusually annoying or severe to the point of causing concern that the patient typically thinks to see a doctor. Even then, not all doctors are trained in methods used to discover the underlying cause of health problems. Many diagnose and prescribe treatment based on symptoms alone.
Conventional medicine is truly wonderful at treating disease-state conditions.
Unfortunately its focus on drugs also tends to suppress early-stage symptoms rather than treat their underlying causes. This can have the effect of delaying treatment until a disease state has developed
Functional Medicine Testing Offers Hope!
The basic idea is to eliminate the underlying causes and support your body’s healthy metabolic function. Functional medicine is a science-based health care approach to assess, prevent and treat complex chronic disease. Functional medicine evaluates the body as a whole with special attention to the relationship of one body system to another and the nutrient imbalances and toxic overload that may adversely affect these relationships.
The vast majority of modern-day illness is not from acute illness that can be easily diagnosed and treated. Most illness is chronic and almost always preceded by a lengthy period of declining function in one or more of the body's systems. Functional medicine is a new clinical model that replaces outdated and ineffective acute-care models of health care and attempts to return patients to wellness. Illness is addressed by identifying specific dysfunctions that have contributed to the disease state. Those dysfunctions are, for each of us, the result of lifelong interactions among our environment, our lifestyle and our genetic predispositions.
If you have been struggling with a chronic health condition, call our office for a consultation on how we can help!
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