Welcome to my newest blog. I am very excited to be writing about the policy, position and theory of naturopathic (Complementary and Alternative) medicine. I will focus on how ND function professionaly and where they exist, politically, within the confines of our Medically-centred and Evidence-based health care system.
My other blogs, MillieSays and MillieSaysHealth are both patient-centred health-tip sites, based on wellness and preventative medicine. The goal being to provide the public with tools for self-self and at-home care. I believe it is more than possible to keep one's health in one's own hands to a large degree with some basic physiology and understanding of nutrition, supplementation and aspects of a good lifestyle. Family-care in the home with modalities from a kitchen cupboard of 'lore, health food and vitamin store focus on prevention and treatment of minor acute conditions supporting wellness while limiting one's use of medications unnecessarily. Alternative medicine at home serves a dual purpose as avoiding unnecessary over-the-counter medications and prescriptions alike benefits the plight for wellness, reducing the number and dependence on these medications in the short and long-term.
This site is an extention of my political thoughts on healthcare. It is a sociolo-political, philosophical health-care blog on why naturopathic doctors are the ideal primary care providers. MDs should actually be secondary care and tertiary care physicians, handling the sickest and urgent of cases. Alternative care practitioners such as NDs, TCM doctors, nutritionists, osteopaths and nurse practitioners should be front line working on prevention and chronic care management by improving overall health and wellbeing, quality of life, nutrition, and lifestyle factors. This model is cheaper, health-wise, prevention-focused, individually-tailored, accessible and sensible.
Due the the name of this site, I am obviously a fan of Dr. Jerome Groopman MD, a medical doctor and a staff journalist at The New Yorker Magazine. He has recently written a book called "How Doctors Think". He is a fellow Canadian, maybe a fellow duel citizen as he lives in the US. If he is, then we have this in common, and a birth-right to the health care of the continent. He takes a very brave stance in his book, criticizing the evidence-based diagnostic approach followed by all north american medical schools, hospitals and really presents individual, patient-centred care as the ideal method of diagnosis and treatment. In his book he basically describes the ideal medical practice as being identifical to most Naturopathic medical practices in Canada and the US, whereby the doctor takes a vested holistic , mind-body approach to the medical interview, relying on physiology, anatomy, lifestyle and history (personal and medical), as opposed to 'heuristics' to get to the bottom of the problem. NDs have more time, it's the beauty of our medical structure. We give ourselves the time to get to the know the patient so that we can fruitfully apply a subclinical diagnosis and therefore effectively prevent illnesses before they begin. ND Diagnose and treat based on holistic physiological signs and symptoms, mental and emotional state and nutritional biomarkers rather than set-criteria depicting an illness. NDs then treat patients using the best ratio of harm reduction to effective results that they can, using their alternative modalities.
Kudos to Dr. Groopman for unveiling some secret language and diagnosic short-cuts used in the medical/hospital model. He has basically exposed the topic of medical protocol and asked up to question the value of evidence-based medicine. This conversation topic has been in want by NDs and members of the educated public who have for generations been quaranteened from an honest, human-based approach to medical practice, in exchange for a 'old boys school mentality that those who wear the white coat are deserving of God-like status.
We now know that doctors are people, and the medical system ought to take a more human-approach. The need for suitable policy will follow toe, and naturopathic medicine will take a more-recognized place in medical model of present, if I have anything to do with it. People need more.
xox dr millie lytle BA, ND
Naturopathic Doctor: sociologist, research practitioner
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