What Your Doctor Does Not Want You to Know

What’s all this controversy about alternative or complimentary health care anyway?

It seems that when many allopathic (aka “traditional”) physicians are asked about their thoughts regarding nutrition and natural healthcare, they reply “there’s no evidence for that witchcraft, it’s a waste of time and money.”

The truth, however, is that thousands of people worldwide have benefited from improvements in diet, herbs, nutritional supplements and other non-drug therapies. Not to mention that tens of thousands of peer-reviewed scientific studies have been performed which demonstrate the safety, cost-effectiveness and benefits of natural medicine for a wide variety of chronic health problems including, but not limited to, heart disease, cancer, arthritis, fatigue, obesity, infertility, headaches, chronic pain and many others.

For example, you can go to the Services section at: www.intmedny.com and click on the Scientific References button at the end for evidence on Vitamin C’s benefits in a large number of diseases.

Then why are well educated and obviously well intentioned physicians often so dead set against holistic or complimentary or alternative health care practices?

First of all, not all allopathic physicians are against holistic practices and those that are, I am sure, are biased and/or under pressure from their medical practices and/or hospitals not to give credence towards non-insurance reimbursable services such as holistic health care.  Some doctors claim that there is no reasonable scientific evidence that nutrition and natural medicine works.

A lack of scientific evidence is not the problem, as anyone with research knowledge knows by exploring the National Library of Medicine at www.pubmed.com. This website provides medical abstracts and, when searched correctly, clearly demonstrates that alternative and nutritional therapies work.

My experience having worked with thousands of patients over the last twenty-plus years in clinical practice is that some doctors are just ignorant!  How do I know? My patients tend to know more than their doctors and this is their conclusion from questioning the so-called “expert” physicians.  Final takeaway…if you want an accurate opinion about nutrition ask a doctor who has training in the subject and is not just being defensive at the expense of your health!

“My doctor says that nutrition is a waste of time and cannot help my disease condition or symptoms.” Then why is it that even most non-physicians reading this article know the following? High fat foods increase one’s risk of developing cancer, heart disease and colon cancer; trans fats can cause heart disease and cancer; the Mediterranean Diet is proven to reverse heart disease and help cancers; calcium supplements are given to help osteoporosis; vitamin D helps prevent fatigue, breast and prostate cancer; vitamin C helps prevent colds; niacin lowers cholesterol; magnesium lowers blood pressure; raspberries can reduce inflammation, increase immune function and are heart healthy – this is just a small sampling of how nutrition helps to prevent and reverse illness and disease.

Proper nutrition obviously reduces the risk of chronic degenerative disease and no reputable scientist would argue with this point.  Careful laboratory assessment, like the type I can provide through my Blood Detective Logic system along with a careful health history and nutritional examination, go a long way towards individualizing one’s health plan and reducing disease risk.

Keep in mind that, “just because your doctor did not learn about nutritional and natural health care in medical school” does not mean that it does not offer health potential.

Dr. Michael Wald is the director of nutritional services at Integrated Medicine of Mount Kisco.

For more information go to www.intmedny.com and or call (914) 242-8844.