Nutritional Medicine

Overview

Nutritional Medicine can be simply defined as the relationship of food to the well-being of the human body. It also encompasses the study of environmental effects on the quality of foods, and the impact of nutritional factors on health and disease. For medicinal and terapeutic effects, nutritional medicine uses food, and individual nutrients in doses only achievable in supplement form.

Philosophy

Nutrients are involved in the creation of every molecule and the maintenance of every system in the body. The body requires more than 45 nutrients to maintain health. Many vitamins and minerals act as coenzymes in promoting essential chemical reactions. They help regulate metabolism, assist in the formation and maintenance of bones and tissues, hormones, nervous system chemicals, and genetic material. Subtle nutrient deficiencies can occur before the onset of frank, classical deficiency. Such marginal deficiencies may ultimately contribute to the development of degenerative diseases. Nutritional medicine aims to optimize nutrition according to individual biochemical, environmental and health states.

Conditions Commonly Treated

Nutritional medicine has been shown to be effective for:

Digestive complaints (bloating, indigestion, reflux, nausea, flatulence, IBS, colitis, Chrohn's disease, candidiasis)
Chronic fatigue, insomnia
Blood sugar imbalance (diabetes, insulin resistance, hypoglycaemia)
Cardiovascular disease (high cholesterol, high blood pressure)
Infertility, pre-conceptual care, pregnancy, post-pregnancy
Poor immune function (frequent colds and infections)
Weight management (under or overweight, eating disorders)
Allergies or food sensitivities

What To Expect During A Treatment

A variety of methods are used to evaluate nutritional status. Some of the common tools used in the clinical evaluation process include a thorough medical history (including family history of disease) dietary analysis (including eating habits and food intake), lifestyle analysis (including exercise, stress, sleeping patterns). This information is evaluated by the practitioner and used to create a diet and lifestyle plan and prescribe supplementation for the individual.