Our medical education system in America has taught our doctors a method of problem-solving that is very pathology or disease driven. The doctors are trained to narrow down what is “wrong” with the patient by using a method of differential diagnosis including lab tests, MRI’s, ultrasounds, and other diagnostic tests to identify or visualize the diseased or damaged tissue. A final diagnosis is determined by matching the test results showing the diseased tissue with the symptoms presented by the patient.

Unfortunately, this rarely reveals the root cause of the problem, that if correctly addressed, could often reverse the patient’s symptoms.

Using a functional medicine approach to understand our patients’ symptoms requires a new way of problem-solving on the part of the doctor and requires a vast knowledge of clinical nutrition. The latter is what we do here at Root Cause Medical Clinic.

4 Reasons our Medical System Fails

1. Patients have symptoms but are told they are “fine”– Have you ever gone to the doctor feeling lousy with multiple symptoms and are told that there is nothing wrong with you? The doctor says this because the tests were normal – the tests did not show any disease process.

Does that mean that there is nothing wrong and the symptoms are not real? Absolutely not. The system of diagnosis being used has failed to find out what’s really wrong.

Functional medicine and clinical nutrition use other methods of finding the root cause. Symptoms can occur for many years before a standard lab test that only finds disease will show a problem, but Functional medicine testing is more sensitive and will show problems sooner – exactly what you need in order to regain your health.

A new patient started this week who has gained 45lb in the past year. In the past, she was always slim with a stable weight and enjoyed exercising regularly. Upon complaining to her doctor of the weight gain plus multiple other complaints, her primary physician told her not to worry about it because she saw many patients much heavier than her!

2. Multiple problems are not evaluated to see what they have in common– Today’s medicine is very compartmentalized. There is a specialist for each part of the body.

Here’s an example: a patient complains to his or her primary care physician of migraine headaches, abdominal pain, and severe eczema. The patient is referred to a neurologist for the migraine, a gastroenterologist for abdominal pain, and a dermatologist for eczema. But could all of these symptoms be caused by common factors? Absolutely.

Will the three separate specialists work together to determine common causes? Not likely. Our bodies do not work in a compartmentalized fashion they have to be looked upon as an integrated whole.

In the above example of the patient with headaches, abdominal pain, and eczema, we frequently do find one root cause that is creating all those symptoms. When we complete a program with such a patient they not only have all those symptoms resolved, but they are on no medication either.

3. Negative test results often result in a doctor telling the patient that the problem is “mental” -This is a too common conclusion reached when the standard lab tests reveal normal or negative results. Simply because no lab tests showed a physical, hormonal or biochemical problem, does not mean that there isn’t one. It just means the correct tests were not performed. And it certainly does not mean that the problem is “all in your head”!

The inappropriate and often rapid decision to use potentially dangerous anti-anxiety or anti-depressant medications in cases like this is far too common. Functional medicine and clinical nutrition have answers for why tests can be negative and it usually lies in the area of incorrect lab tests.

Functional medicine lab tests measure malfunction as well as disease, making them much more sensitive at detecting imbalances. Traditional lab tests are mostly designed to detect disease and therefore will show there is nothing wrong if no frank disease state is detected.

It is a source of great frustration for us to meet patients who are not depressed or anxious begin to doubt their own ability to evaluate how they feel about themselves, due to a doctor telling them that their symptoms are mentally based. Time and time again this has happened, only to later discover with the help of clinical nutrition that their symptoms were coming from very real problems that had nothing to do with their mental state.

4. Medications are given to treat symptoms without a diagnosis– Many patients are treated with medications to see if the medication will work to lessen their symptom, even though there is not a clear diagnosis. This approach could relieve the symptom, but as with most medications, it does not address the cause of the problem. And of course, it interjects the various side effects associated with all medications into the picture.

There are certainly times medications can reduce risks of more serious health problems, such as using a blood pressure medication to prevent a stroke. However, even in such a case, without discovering the underlying root cause of the patient’s high blood pressure, simply masking it with a drug will not restore that patient to optimal health.

I wanted to provide you with this information regarding the model of functional medicine that we use in our medical center. Our medical doctor, doctor of naturopathy, and clinical nutritionist all work together for the purpose of getting to the underlying root cause that is creating the symptoms being experienced by our patients. I am in no way stating that traditional medicine has no use. For acute injuries and serious unstable diseases, the hospital setting is the best place for you. We would like to prevent that from occurring and argue that a disease-based model of medicine does not accomplish that goal.

About two years ago, several doctors including Dr. Hyman, Dr. Pritikin, Dr. Weil, and others testified before congress. Their contention was that the vast majority of what we spend on healthcare could be eradicated if we spent more time on diet and lifestyle enhancement. While all agreed that we were excellent at crisis care, they similarly agreed that in the area of prevention and education we were sadly lacking. Each of these well-known doctors presented compelling evidence of the above after culling their 25 years of research and clinical experience.

We agree with their analysis and our clinical nutrition department is happy to provide what we consider to be some of the best preventive care and early diagnosis to treat the reason why you have the symptoms you do and to design a program to restore you to optimal health. We love what we do and are happy to help you to begin feeling good again!