INTEGRATIVE HEALTH EXPLAINED

Nodding your head as though you understand what everyone means when they say things like 'Holistic' and 'Integrative', but have no idea what that actually means? Read on.

INTEGRATIVE HEALTH

Integrative health seeks to integrate or unify various areas of health and looks at the interplay of many areas at once. To practice integrative wellness, a practitioner may also seek to combine or unify a combination of health practices. An integrative practitioner will blend various therapies, modalities and interventions. Integrative doctors may draw from allopathic (standard Western medical practice) interventions as well as energetic or herbal interventions as well.

The benefit of this approach is that - such a perspective it allows for a broader, larger, fuller picture of a being - which makes it possible to better understand the whole of whats going on, rather than getting lost in the weeds of many, tiny seemingly separate issues or symptoms. And combining therapies allows for a much broader array of options for possible treatments.

HOLISTIC HEALTH

The Oxford dictionary offers the following definition of 'holistic': "In Philosophy:

Characterized by the belief that the parts of something are intimately interconnected and explicable only by reference to the whole.

In Medicine: Characterized by the treatment of the whole person, taking into account mental and social factors, rather than just the symptoms of a disease."

COMPLIMENTARY & ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE (CAM)

The National Center for Complimentary and Integrative Health outlines the difference between these health care approaches

"If a non-mainstream practice is used together with conventional medicine, it’s considered “complementary.”
If a non-mainstream practice is used in place of conventional medicine, it’s considered “alternative.”

FINDING THE ROOT CAUSE

When we have a symptom, such as dry skin, lethargy, headaches, high blood pressure, digestive issues or aching joints - that is the body talking to us in it's language: symptoms. Symptoms are not to be squashed or silenced by means of shutting them off; they are instead to be LISTENED to as signs of imbalance or insufficiency somewhere downstream in whatever physiological pathway is involved in the creation of the symptom that is presenting. At the VERY ROOT of the problem there is some sort of an impediment to the body to perform a regular physiological function - if we merely silence the bodies cries which translate into "something needs assistance over here!" with a big arrow attached to the sign - then we miss the message, and even if we are able to superficially band-aide the symptom, the underlying cause GETS WORSE.

WHAT ON EARTH HAS THAT GOT TO DO WITH NUTRITION?

The food that we put into our bodies is the fuel that is running all of our physiological functions. When we put poor quality fuel into our systems, they run poorly. When we don't put enough of a certain nutrient into our bodies, that system won't perform so well. Nutritional status is at the heart of a great deal of health complaints and symptoms. Figuring out the root cause of your symptoms and understanding how nutritional changes can support or change health status is what integrative nutrition is all about.

"THE NATURAL HEALING FORCE IN EACH ONE OF US IS THE GREATEST FORCE IN GETTING WELL. OUR FOOD SHOULD BE OUR MEDICINE. OUR MEDICINE SHOULD BE OUR FOOD."

- Hippocrates