PERFECT HEALTH TODAY

ANSWERS TO YOUR QUESTIONS
ABOUT NATUROPATHY

People tend to look at natural medicine with skepticism. But those who ask honest questions usually find their efforts are rewarded with sensible, safer choices for treating the health conditions they are concerned about. And they begin to gain control over their own health-future.

If you have never been interested in natural health and healing, now is a great time to start—and this page is a great place to begin.

Use the information below to help you make intelligent choices about your health. Probe these facts, points, and explanations about the medical discipline called NATUROPATHY to help you make a fair and complete assessment of whether natural medicine would add value to your health future.

What Is Natural Medicine? It is...
1. A SENSIBLE, DRUG-FREE WAY TO GOOD HEALTH

2. A SAFE ALTERNATIVE

3. FOCUSED ON CAUSES

4. BACKED BY COMPREHENSIVE TRAINING AND SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

5. FEATURES IN-DEPTH PATIENT CONSULTATIONS

6. PROMOTES INDIVIDUALIZED TREATMENT PROTOCOLS

7. BLENDED HEALTH CARE

8. MORE PREVENTION, LESS DAMAGE CONTROL

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1. A SENSIBLE, DRUG-FREE WAY TO GOOD HEALTH

Most people desire to achieve a state of optimum health and wellness that will last a lifetime.

But regardless our resolve, we inevitably encounter symptoms that make us feel unwell: a pain, low energy, headache, digestive problems, insomnia, anxiety, depression, nervousness, to name a few.

The response to any one of these symptoms is, typically, a visit to a physician.

Ideally, in 15 minutes you are weighed-in and your vitals are checked. Then you are given the opportunity to describe your symptoms and undergo a quick assessment of your condition.

(An early 2007 study indicated patients get, on average, 18 seconds to explain what has gone wrong before being interrupted by the attending doctor, who is generally ready with a diagnosis. This has lead to wide-spread misdiagnosis, which has contributed to the rise in deaths caused by the health system. More on this topic below.)

No doubt, the medical personnel, technologies, and expertise available to us through conventional medicine are excellent, probably the best the world has to offer in terms of elaborate tools and scientific capabilities. Taking all of that into account, your doctor will consider the possible diagnoses, then create a regimen comprised of vast resources at his or her disposal, including tests, lab work, and a variety of drugs. You might even be sent to an expert to look deeper into an area of ill health that a generalist is not prepared to diagnose.

But, there is a problem in all of this elegant fact-finding (results that naturopaths depend on for diagnosis, too), a problem that does not make sense; all too often an experience with the overwhelmed medical system ends with few concrete answers, greater fear and confusion, lots of pills, and the possibility of physical conditions that are worse than those we went in with.

The single greatest problem to many critics of the system is that conventional medicine turns to an array of drugs in response to every form of illness and disease.

Drugs can produce excellent results, alleviating symptoms and attacking specific ailments with precision. But, by their very nature, drugs introduce the possibility of complex chemical changes in the body, often creating situations that run counter to individual organ or systemic function. They can create toxicity and subject you to harsh reactions and side effects that do more harm than good.

When the drugs fail to bring relief and the procedures seem to make things worse, some people decide "no more!" They begin to take a look at alternative medicine practices, like naturopathy.

Suddenly, the world of natural health begins to make sense!

From the very beginning, patients discover naturopathy is a wholly different approach to treating medical ailments. The naturopathic doctor takes time to consider more than the discrete physical symptoms a patient is experiencing. The naturopath's "holistic" approach takes into account many non-medical aspects of a patient's life. In fact, the naturopath will seem to do less about symptoms than most of us are accustomed to at our physician's office (for instance, did you ever consider that fever can be a good thing?!)

After spending time becoming acquainted with the patient and his or her profile, the naturopath will start various processes that begin restoring the body to a point of total system health.

Even though some patients experience immediate results, most often the affects of natural medicines and therapies are slow, allowing the body the time to reverse the initial damage done by years of neglect.

You begin to change your whole life for your health's sake.

The gentle and relatively slow changes lead a lot of people to the unfortunate conclusion that the medicines are ineffectual, and natural medicine fraudulent. But, unlike conventional medicine, natural medicine practices require whole-life changes not everyone is willing to make (giving up foods, beverages, and other habits that compromise human health).

The required lifestyle changes give the body a chance to begin to protect and heal itself of many health issues, including the minor ailments and symptoms that lead us to the medical doctor in the first place. Eventually, the body is able to better fend off diseases, and possibly prevent them from ever developing. The patient eases into a life of generally good health, possibly higher levels of energy, and a better outlook on his or her health future.

It is worth repeating: just as it takes a while for poor health to develop (sometimes over a period of years) the naturopath takes time to reverse the process, allowing the body to restore itself to optimal health.

It makes sense to gently allow the body to heal itself.
It makes greater sense to obtain that health state without the intervention of man-made drugs.

The naturopathy doctor will not mask a condition with drugs to "get you up and running" as soon as possible. Instead, your new doctor will apply the gentlest of medicines, their effectiveness proven over time. You will not become part of an on-going experiment, and you will not be subjected to the much-anticipated litany of expected side-effects.

The natural health doctor's medicines are all-natural, made of plant life and minerals which are minimally processed from their natural states into the medicines and supplements the doctor prescribes. Natural medicines encourage genuine rehabilitation and long-lasting health by working the way they were designed to work in nature, with a body functioning the way it was designed to function in the first place.

By not administering drugs the naturopath avoids jeopardizing the rest of the body's health, eliminating damage that drugs can do.

Once you make the decision to experience for yourself the principles of naturopathy at work, a whole new approach to disease prevention and problem solving begins.

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2. A SAFE ALTERNATIVE

Despite the aura of suspicion and intrigue sometimes placed on alternative medicine, naturopathy is fundamentally a gentle and safe medical discipline. In fact, it would appear the opposite is true about conditions in established medicine.

A report by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, Nov. 29, 1999 entitled To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System, reveals alarming information that points to an awful reality—the trusted medical system of the U.S. is responsible for killing hundreds of thousands of people each year.

In a related published article, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) cited the above report, along with the revelation that thousands of deaths could be attributed to PROPER – not improper – use of drugs.

And in another article, the allopathic medical community indicated medical errors were the 3rd leading cause of death in North America (JAMA, Vol. 284, 26 July, 2000).

From the Canadian paper, the Globe & Mail (October 4, 2002) came the report, "Medical mistakes are killing people. Errors by health care workers during medical procedures and hospital stays, adverse drug reactions, incorrectly and correctly prescribed or administered drugs, and surgery mishaps account for over 250,000 deaths in the U.S. per year." Some said that number could be as high as 700,000.

An article published in the British Medical Journal, February 22, 2003, entitled Top Scientist Warns Of "Sickness" In US Health System, begins with this introduction:

"'The US health system is itself sick and needs a national commission to get it back on the road to recovery,' Floyd Bloom, president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, told the association's annual meeting last week.

"Dr Bloom is the head of neuropharmacology at the Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, California. That an architect of modern neuroscience chose to open the largest single public science conference in the United States to make his point suggests more than just a cautionary diagnosis."

Since release of the release of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies study, initiatives were set forth to correct the trend. But in five years conditions are largely unchanged. In summer of 2005, Congress began to address this crisis with appropriations for further studies of problems in the medical care system. New guidelines for patient care have been established by leading medical groups, and a repository of patient feedback about the care they receive is being compiled on every federally funded hospital in the U.S.

Medical communities have been encouraged to apply new procedures and safeguards that would reduce the numbers of deaths, but the extremely difficult task of making system-wide changes that might reverse the death toll have been slow.

Patients and practitioners in the world of natural medicine enjoy a completely different experience. It is rare, indeed, when a naturopathic patient is harmed by the natural health modalities and protocols; the medicines are from nature and the treatments are time-honored, and for the most part, non-invasive. Doctors of naturopathy do not use prescription drugs (exceptions exist in some states) and treatments are tailored to the individual rather than a "group average."

With few exceptions, naturopathy uses natural, sensible modalities that are gentler than those in allopathic medicine. On the whole, naturopathic medicines are more easily accepted and tolerated by the human body.

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3. FOCUSED ON CAUSES

Naturopathic doctors believe the over-emphasis in symptom elimination eventually leads to more illness. As is mentioned above, the naturopath administers medications that help alleviate discomfort caused by symptoms, but not at first impulse. The main focus of their work is to find and treat the cause of the symptoms in the individual patient, a search that considers information about the whole life of the person and the context in which the person lives.

Naturopathy and other alternative disciplines recognize that the physical, mental, and emotional aspects of one's being are interrelated; any one of these aspects influences positively or negatively one or more of the others.

Natural medicine is sometimes called "holistic" medicine; treat the whole person in the search for a root cause of the individual's health problem.

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4. BACKED BY COMPREHENSIVE TRAINING
AND SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

Naturopathy has been around for along time, longer than its medical school counterparts. Schools have been educating doctors of alternative medicine in the U.S. since before the turn of 19th century.

Although the medicines used by naturopaths are mostly from humble plant life or naturally-occuring minerals, the science behind what natural medicines do and how the amazing results are achieved is under constant scrutiny by research professionals of all types, as any plausible scientific endeavor would be. Doctors of natural health and healing share information with each other and with physicians who are interested in positive outcomes and ultimately how the method of outcome affects the patient.

Natural medicine is not considered valid by some. They are usually the kind of people that are bothered by the fact that the Federal Drug Administration (FDA), the government agency charged with oversight of medical issues in the U.S., is not able to "organize and contain" natural medicine, study its outcomes, and issue comprehensive findings about it. Therefore, the FDA cannot legitimately endorse with its stamp of approval any natural (alternative) medicine or natural (alternative) medicine protocol.

Strange as it may seem to some, the FDA does not actually possess all knowledge about the subject of health and healing. There are myriad established alternative treatments, therapies, modalities, natural medicines, and medical perspectives around the globe that are proven to work, despite the fact they are not approved by the U.S. FDA.

But isn't it true natural medicines and "alternative" therapy practices emanate from backward nations, magic, and folklore?

Naturopathy has benefited from information gathered over centuries from many countries around the globe, including countries that to this day remain on the lower rungs of the economic ladder. But we make a terrible mistake in the U.S. by assuming third-world knowledge is myth-based-on-legend-based-on ignorance, and we lose valuable perspectives on life as we tend to relegate old-world knowledge to a mental file entitled "Quaint-but-Wrong."

Arrogance in the U.S. corporate culture, especially among those who guide the medical establishment, plays a huge role in keeping the scientific benefits of naturopathy from the general public. But, this, too, is changing with the arrival of medical personnel from all over the world, sympathetic to and well-versed in alternative medicine, hired into the U.S. medical establishment. More doctors of medicine are integrating other perspectives, yet remaining MD's, through the administered Complementary and Alternative (CAM) program recognized by the American Medical Association.

Throughout history, civilizations endeavored to care for the health and welfare of their people. More than just a desire to help, care had a highly practical application—the health of an individual was potentially an issue of life or death for all; diseased individuals could wipe out an entire village—or nation— in a short amount of time; the healthy and fit sustained life through physical labor. Long before global trade routes were developed, isolated groups collected and passed on healing remedies made from indigenous plants and minerals.

How do we account for diverse and separate cultures arriving at similar methods of care? People in countries separated by vast oceans and impenetrable mountain ranges managed to duplicate formulations of plant life. using the same or similar resources to achieve identical benefits and outcomes.

The information used by naturopaths to treat patient illness today has been forced through the highly effective filter of history. We have to ask, why would people pass information from one generation to the next if the outcome was of no consequence? Information of the ancient caregiver was shared because the it proved to work. The over-arching good done by the herbalist doctor in ancient times is evident in the information passed forward. The healing properties of plants and minerals found in nature are still available today in lands across the globe, despite the centuries that stand between then and now.

With the notable exception of the U.S., most other industrialized nations use natural healing methods as the baseline treatment for illness and disease. Doctors in other industrialized countries are taught to administer naturopathic treatments alongside allopathic practices and their pharmaceutical applications.

Prejudices against natural medicine are deeply entrenched in U.S. culture. Even so, these harmful biases are not part of early U.S. history. The negatives notwithstanding, natural healing modality training in the U.S. is as extensive and comprehensive as any nation on earth. We have some of the best minds and resources in naturopathy available anywhere in the world. Alternative therapies that were not initiated or perfected in the U.S. are practiced daily in the U.S. by some of the best naturopathic doctors the world has to offer.

With a little background information and a few well-placed questions, anyone in the U.S. or abroad should be able to find a trustworthy naturopathic doctor. And you can be assured the treatment protocols he or she will utilize are not ancient satanic rituals or remedies made with entrails of exotic beasts, but are scientifically sound, researched, and tested over time.

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5. IN-DEPTH PATIENT CONSULTATIONS

During the first consultation, naturopathic doctors typically take 45 minutes to 1½ hours with a patient to begin the healing relationship.

Patients are asked a variety of questions in order to achieve an accurate profile of their current health status and health history. They are encouraged to air all their concerns and ask any and all questions they might have. Many patients say they have found in their naturopathic doctor one who is truly listening and really cares.

Principle to natural medicine is the belief that the doctor must know what is going on in a patient's whole life. They seek to know the patient's physical, mental and emotional conditions, know their routines and habits, what they do in their work, and discover general feelings about themselves and their health.

All of this leads to both a better diagnosis of the underlying problems and the possible causes that led to a patient's unhealthy state.

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6. INDIVIDUALIZED TREATMENT PROTOCOLS

Health-conscious people in our country spend billions each year on vitamins, herbal remedies and over-the-counter-drugs. Their purchases are often based on little more than advertising, articles in popular magazines, marketing hype, trial and error, or just plain hope.

This is an expensive and potentially dangerous way to buy medications. Just as it is in the pharmaceutical world, herbs and supplements can adversely interact with each other, just not as dangerously. Adverse affects between herbs and pharmaceuticals are possible.

A naturopathic doctor can guide you, help you eliminate the guesswork, wade through the hype, and highlight erroneous information. These benefits of natural medical care protect your safety and save you money.

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7. BLENDED HEALTH CARE

Naturopathy doctors are open-minded about sharing medical information about their patients with other physicians. Most are ready and willing to work out a collaborative plan with an MD to blend the collective perspectives and experiences in order to get a complete picture of the possible causes and solutions to the most troubling diseases. In the last few years, medical doctors have shown greater openness to working with naturopathic doctors, especially when a patient insists on the opinions of both.

Dr. Hopkins recommends you secure at least one allopathic doctor and one holistic doctor. Use them both as advisors in your quest for better health. If either of them is unwilling to work as a team for your benefit, then move on and find doctors who will.

Doctors should always focus on the best possible health care for the patient. They are your hired hands; they may be more expensive than your painter, carpenter, plumber or carpet layer, but they still work for you. Don't ever forget that!

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8. MORE PREVENTION, LESS DAMAGE CONTROL

Prevention is central to all holistic healing practices, including naturopathic medicine.

We have established, in some of the points above, disturbing facts concerning the U.S. medical system. Of the major illnesses we face, heart disease, strokes, and cancer are today's big killers. Little in the documentation of those responsible for the future of health care in America suggests dramatic changes are on the way. Clearly, the focus of our health future must be more on prevention, less on damage control.

Doctors of naturopathy adhere to the old saying, "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure." Research in the world of natural medicine, past and present, proves many things can be done to reduce the risks associated with development of these major illnesses–even when there is a genetic predisposition to one of these or another disease.

It is possible for the naturopathic doctor to address almost any health circumstance. It is the ND's job to cut through the clutter of misinformation and provide guidance to help you to prevent disease and maintain the highest quality of health you can attain.

Your first order of business is to obtain information, balance your eating enjoyment with good nutrition, and a gain an understanding of the nature and scope of your health choices. The best way to accomplish this: visit a doctor of naturopathy soon.

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