Doctor Denial – Why Most Doctors Ignore Gluten Sensitivity
Traditional Medicine is Flawed –
The pill for an ill approach has failed miserably when it comes to modern diseases. Mainstream doctors focus only on symptoms and use synthetic drugs to mask these symptoms. No meaningful treatment is performed in such a way. Ignoring diet and nutrition has lead to a health care crisis in this country. Unfortunately, nutrition is typically not even taught in medical schools. This leaves doctors completely blind to the role of diet in disease. When gluten sensitivity, intolerance, or allergy is mentioned, most doctors look at you like you are crazy. The common physician rhetoric is…
Diet has nothing to do with your ___________.
Just fill in the blank. Skin disease, heart disease, bone disease, celiac disease, autoimmune disease, etc. If you are frustrated with the typical doctors visit, read on below about functional medicine (FM). Keep in mind that Gluten Free Society is in the process of putting together a list of FM doctors so that people across the country can get access to meaningful medical care.
What is Functional Medicine?
Functional medicine is a medical approach that focuses on identifying the causes of disease rather than treating the symptoms. It seeks to understand the origins of chronic disease so that meaningful treatment and prevention methods can be developed and implemented. The functional medicine approach is a partnership between the patient and the doctor. The goal of this partnership is to bring the patient back to health as well as to teach the patient about the core principles of health maintenance and prevention.
Functional Medicine Philosophy –
The philosophy recognizes that each patient is a unique individual with a unique set of genetics and biochemistry, as well as a unique set of environmental and lifestyle factors. These genetic/environment interactions are complex not simple. Thus a person could potentially have the same disease with a completely different set of causes. To that end, the approach of functional medicine relies less on synthetic drugs and more on the thorough investigation of a patient using the following tools:
Comprehensive medical history
Evaluation of the patient’s lifestyle and environmental factors.
Functional outcomes based laboratory workup vs. static labs based on standard deviation bell curves of an assumed normal range.
Comprehensive physical evaluation
Education based approach so that ultimately the patient is less dependent on the doctor to maintain their health.
Mainstream Medicine is Broken –
Mainstream medicine is problem focused. Drugs are prescribed to mask symptoms without concern for the root cause of the disease. Drug companies have a huge influence over what is being taught in medical schools. Additionally, drug companies are allowed to advertise to consumers directly. Both of these practices are extremely unethical and lead to numerous problems.
The new health care bill created socialized medicine. What does this mean for you? – Free care that doesn’t work for chronic health conditions. Medicine is the largest business in the world despite the fact that it has perpetually failed it’s customers. Cancer, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, arthritis, and autoimmune diseases continue to increase and spiral out of control. What is mainstream’s solution? More drugs? Drugs only mask the underlying cause of disease. If drugs haven’t worked to date, why are they perpetually pushed down our throats as the solution?
Town Center Wellness and Dr. Osborne’s Approach –
My approach is to identify the cause for their problem vs. medicating symptoms. The only way success can be achieved is to educate the patient on why the illness exists in the first place. Mainstream medicine places the patient in the role of a victim. Functional medicine empowers the patient with education so that health can be restored. The diagram above illustrates my philosophy. I developed this functional approach to fill the current medical gap.
DNA is influenced by the three outer triangles (these outer triangles represent the environment)
Biochemistry = Nutrition (vitamins, minerals, water, etc) Additionally, food allergies, intolerances, and sensitivities affect biochemistry as do pollution in the air and water.
Physical = structure. For example, being 20 pounds overweight causes excessive pressure on your heart, blood vessels, joints, and more. Exercise greatly influences the physical aspect of the Triangle of Health.
Mental = your psychological and spiritual state of mind.
If you are tired of a 50 minute wait for the doctor followed by a 5 minute consult and a quick drug prescription fix, you are in the right place. Many of you that know me know that I am on the cutting edge of medicine. What I do in my office today to help patients will be common place in medicine in ten years or so. Do you have 10 years to wait to get healthy?
Whether you are local in Houston or Sugar Land or far away (out of state or country), click on the become a patient tab if you have been chronically ill and don’t know why.
If you are a doctor and would like to get involved, please contact Sally at glutenology@gmail.com
