“The doctor of the future will give no medication but will interest his patients in the care the human frame, diet, and in the cause and prevention of disease.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
Over 175 years ago, the famous US essayist and visionary wrote about the possibilities of about how future generations might engage with medicine, health, and disease. The future has been arriving rapidly over the last many decades.
Yes Allopathic Medicine which centers around disease management primarily focuses on using drugs and surgery has been respected as the standard of excellence. Deeply devoted doctors, nurses, and many kinds of medical support practitioners have been most often the first to be consulted as the primary authorities for people with physical and mental symptoms. The focus on treating disease taught in Medical schools has been funded by drug and food companies to establish research on the effectiveness of this orientation. The inter relationships between corporate profits and belief systems about what is needed or is the only way to treat has often been not obvious or not transparent at best.
At the beginning of the 1900s, several European MDs promoted approaches in the US to deal with disease by encouraging the body’s natural capabilities using natural therapies to correct imbalances. Naturopathic Medicine has thrived in many areas of the world and gradually more research is now available on the benefits of “natural drugs” in herbs and food and different amounts of nutrients than the minimum daily requirements.
In the last 50 years, Jeff Bland, PhD has been one of the most respected academic voices in the medical world to bring practitioners together to appreciate they do not have to be an “alternatives” in a model that is based on more natural approaches. He coined the term “Functional Medicine” and became the “pied piper” and through his scientific research and books has created medical academies and programs that certify Medical Doctors and other allied health professionals. These credentialed physicians are trained as educators to integrate many ways to diagnosis and treat patients beyond usual Allopathic medical school studies.
There are many medical traditions from around the world that respect how to use the medicinal value in food, herbs, and concentrated nutrients. Naturopathic Medicine is one system that trains physicians how to initiate a person’s innate ability to heal using many kinds of natural therapies. The focus of engagement is to treat people as individuals with different strengths and weaknesses and not treat just numbers or disease conditions. The content of what NDs or Functional Medicine doctors recommend might complement or replace synthetic drugs or improve surgical outcomes. The context of focusing on lifestyle, mind/body interrelationships, and coaching clients how to access their deepest wisdom to access their profound capacity for healing can be more radically different that any prescription.
A key component why many patients appreciate Naturopathic or Functional Medicine is the kind of partnership they develop with their body and the learning they receive from their doctors. This is not about replacing all medication with vitamin supplements or radical diets. This is about learning to learning to our physical sensations, knowing a bit more about our body works and what foods might help or hinder optimal energy and how stress and challenging emotions and feelings need healthy outlets for expression. Some NDs and Functional Medicine docs are also Holistically oriented and appreciate we humans are a Quadrinity the sum of us is greater that all the parts. We are physical, mental, emotional and spiritual beings. And the inter relationships of these aspects often suffers when we overly focus only on 1 at the expense of the others.
Wellness is an orientation that we are a quadrinity. When we live in the world from that point of view we develop attitudes that are aligned with inspiration and gratitude even when we are deeply challenged.
“The doctor of the future will give fewer medications and will educate clients to learn about what initiates optimizing health and deeper healing by opening conversations for possibilities about the nature of nourishing and nurturing our body. How to care for our human body suit with food, air, movement, and liquids in a context of listening to our emotions while appreciating a larger view of life that includes how to contribute to others and connect with different rhythms of life are some of the passions many doctors know can be powerful allies to age gracefully as well treat some of the most complicated diseases.
Dr. Barry Taylor, ND