Working with a Naturopathic Doctor
Have you ever considered working with a holistic or naturopathic doctor? Are you struggling with fatigue, digestive issues, irregular menstrual cycles, stubborn weight, or any other health concerns, but haven’t found a solution? Are you tired of hearing “your labs look fine” when you don’t feel fine? As naturopathic doctors we have an arsenal of tools we use to discover the root cause of these symptoms.
So what exactly does it look like to work with a naturopathic doctor? At your initial visit, we will spend about 90 minutes with our patients to gather in depth information about your current health concerns, comprehensive medical history, and lifestyle. This allows us to get a comprehensive understanding of who you are as a whole person not just physically, but mentally and spiritually as well. Your doctor will then order comprehensive functional labs based on their assessment. These labs provide us with clues to detect patterns in your physiology that are contributing to your symptoms. Some examples of labs include, hormone panels, full thyroid panel, micronutrients, inflammation markers, cholesterol markers, kidney and liver function, and immune function. In addition to blood work panels, there are other testing options available to look deeper under the hood.
After your visit, your doctor will provide a comprehensive treatment plan best addressed to meet your individualized needs including nutrition, lifestyle, supplementation, botanical medicine, procedures, and pharmaceuticals if necessary.
About 2 weeks later, you will schedule a lab review where your doctor will thoroughly go through each lab result, the significance of it, what it does in the body, what your results may be telling us, and how to best address it. As naturopathic doctors, we are passionate about educating our patients on what the labs are indicating, what systems may be imbalanced, as well as educating them on proper functioning of each of these systems. It is our goal to arm our patients with the necessary tools to take charge of their own health. After this visit, we take the information from the labs to further customize your treatment plan.
If any of this resonates with you or sounds like something you have been looking for, please book a complimentary discovery call with one of our naturopathic doctors (here) to learn more and get started on your health journey.
By Dr. Rachel Heussner, ND and Dr. Hannah Lollar, ND