In an era where we are personalising our purses, clothes and phone cases, why are we not personalising our healthcare?
If we're happy to pay the extra money to have our initials printed on our belongings, then why aren't we happy to pay the extra to have someone listen to our story and develop an individualised treatment plan that is a reflection of who we are, where we have been and what we are presenting with on the day?
In naturopathic medicine, assessment of the person presenting in front of you is the crux of what we do. We assess your health as a whole, we look at the inter-relationship between the body systems, the flow on effect that may be happening as a result of an imbalance elsewhere in the body and most importantly YOU.
You as an individual. Not you who is the same as 300,000 people with a similar diagnosis such as coeliac disease, you who may be presenting completely differently to the other 299,999 people who have been diagnosed with coeliac disease because you are not merely the sum of your diagnosis. You, as an individual are the sum of all the parts that make you up as a human being. You may have similarities to another person but you will never be chemically exactly the same, emotionally exactly the same, physically exactly the same, because along the way you have been exposed to different things. Like the time you went to Indonesia and were exposed to a whole new array of bacteria, or the time you broke your leg, or the time you ate pasta and tomato sauce for all of the 4 years you went to university, or the time that boy shattered your heart in to one million pieces and you never quite got over it, or when you got sick with glandular fever, or when you worked in a factory for 5 years and were exposed to a whole new kettle of chemicals.
Every different exposure becomes a part of who you are. They may affect how you respond to stress, how your body absorbs nutrients, which short chain fatty acids are being produced in your gut, how your liver functions, the levels of different minerals in your blood, how many red blood cells you have.
Individualising treatment means that we take all of these things in to account. We look at you as a whole and adapt treatment accordingly. Herbal medicine gives the flexibility to create a herbal blend specific to your needs. We may choose one herb to address stress, one to address liver function and one to address immune function all in the one blend. You walk a way with a bottle of herbs that are your personalised mix.
There isn't a one size fits all when it comes to you and your health and the answer to that is choosing personalised healthcare!
