Working with Origins Medicine
We get a couple of questions asked of us more than any others. The first question is what is functional medicine? You can find the answer to that here.
The second question is how does this whole thing work? This is the question I will seek to explain in this post.
Working with us is a long term project
This is not a take two of these pills to obscure your symptoms and call me in the morning type of medicine.
This is investigative health. Investigative health means we seek to understand the root of the problem. We don’t simply try to suppress symptoms like conventional medicine often does. For us accurate diagnosis=accurate treatment.
Whatever your current health status, it has been years in the making. So it can take a little while to regain health and start to optimize.
Working with us means a commitment to better health over your entire life.
We don’t just solve the symptoms in front of us. If we only looked at symptoms instead of investigating and discovering the underlying cause we would be mis-treating you.
Lifestyle accounts for at least 50 percent of the results of any of our programs. The other 50 percent is specific and correct supplementation. I should mention that 95% of the time people who try to create supplement programs themselves completely blow it. Supplementation based on lab test results is the one sure way to know what is necessary and what isn’t.
There is a significant investment that goes into working with us.
The first investment is one of time and lifestyle. Getting healthy and maintaining vitality takes time, focus and energy. Most people fail because they try to do this alone. However, this is your life and the ultimate pay off is the health, vitality, and happiness to fully engage work, family, and leisure.
Our number one mission is to help you succeed. We do this by being with you every step of the way and having a robust coaching program to keep you going even when things get tough.
The second commitment is a financial investment. I have no idea why but we humans seem to have no problem throwing money at all sorts of things but seem to hesitate when it comes to allocating resources to the most important thing of all, your body.
We are comfortable spending almost $10,000 per year on our cars (that’s the average according to AAA), buying tons of things we don’t really need or spending money on expensive dinners and overpriced vacations.
We often treat our bodies like dumpsters. We treat them poorly with almost no maintenance and expect them to keep going and going for ever. Then we’re surprised when they break down!
My point is that it’s all about priorities. If you want to have health, energy, well-being, vitality and wake up energized and excited to face the day, you have to be willing to invest in it. I can’t think of a better investment I’d rather make.
What it Means for Your Health
Working with us is an investment in you. It’s an investment in your health, vitality and well being. And it’s an investment in your future. The adage that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure has never been so true. Even if you are suffering from a real illness, working with us will be preventing lots of frustrating doctor visits in your future, not to mention the tens of thousands you and your relatives will likely save on future medical care.
Thousands of patients have experienced success working with us. We see people get their energy back, be able to sleep well through the night, recover from diseases like IBS, Crohns, reverse burnout, lose weight and recover from debilitating depression and anxiety.
It’s not a miracle cure, but we have a proven track record of success. At Origins we use the same protocols that my mentor Dr. Kalish developed and tested recently in this highly regarded clinical study that was done at the world famous Mayo Clinic.
Functional medicine, Chinese medicine, and lifestyle medicine, in general, is not something you just learn in 4 years. It takes many years of study and application to heal the root of people’s disease. Every member of our clinical team has over a decade of actual clinical practice and we are closely connected to the Functional medicine community as a whole. In fact, we discuss all complex cases on a weekly Grand Rounds call with Dr. Kalish and 10 other Functional medicine doctors with various backgrounds. There are literally hundreds of combined clinical years of experience behind the analysis and implementation of every therapeutic plan.
The Process
We start off with a consultation. This is where we go over your complete health history, discuss your pain points as well as goals. We figure out what lab tests we’re going to run and you walk away with some take home lab tests.
Our lab tests use saliva, urine or stool as samples and can all be done from the comfort of your own home. Then it takes 2-4 weeks to get the results.
Next comes a two week detox. Many patients are dealing with so many issues like inflammation and enzymatic and neurological and hormonal pathways that are broken that without moving out some of the junk that’s stopping everything up, the supplements we prescribe won’t get absorbed.
Most people also tend to lose a few pounds and often report feeling great afterward.
After the detox is complete the labs done and we have a follow-up appointment where we go over the report of findings and create a treatment plan. The treatment plan usually includes a supplement protocol as well as lifestyle interventions.
We then do a check in every month at a minimum to make sure you’re on track. There may be more frequent mini consultations in the beginning to ensure the clinical improvement we expect is being met. In between the monthly check-ins you will get access to our coaching programs with emails, videos and occasional calls and webinars.
After about 6 months we may decide to re-test to see where things are and if we need to course correct. Treatment plans are always logical, progressive, and based on a clear diagnosis and clear objectives. You should never feel lost in the process.
Preventing Future Illness
Finally one of the huge benefits our patients get is that we can often catch small problems before they turn into big problems. A patient with an inflamed gut brought on by an all too common parasite can be saved from years of future anguish or even something worse like an an autoimmune disease by completing a gut testing and rebuilding program with us.
While your regular doctor may order some blood tests when something is already “wrong” we have a string of tests that look for systemic imbalances. By the time a real problem has manifested in the body, an imbalance has been active for years.
A yearly check-in with us goes a long way to preventing and catching things before they become insurmountable.
