Naturopathic Medicine

What is natur­o­pathic medicine?

Natur­o­pathic med­i­cine is a com­pre­hen­sive, holis­tic, and indi­vid­u­al­ized pri­mary health care sys­tem. Draw­ing on knowl­edge sub­stan­ti­ated by thou­sands of years of expe­ri­ence and incor­po­rat­ing mod­ern sci­en­tific research, natur­o­pathic doc­tors use nat­ural sub­stances to stim­u­late the body’s innate capac­ity to heal itself. When dis­ease is present, the focus of natur­o­pathic treat­ment is to address the under­ly­ing cause of ill­ness rather than sim­ply sup­press­ing symp­toms or man­ag­ing dis­ease. A natur­o­pathic doc­tor views the indi­vid­ual as an inte­gral whole, encom­pass­ing the phys­i­cal, men­tal, emo­tional, spir­i­tual, and envi­ron­men­tal aspects of the self. Within this frame­work, no two peo­ple with the same con­di­tion are treated exactly alike.

Natur­o­pathic doc­tors can also com­ple­ment and enhance health care ser­vices pro­vided by other health care pro­fes­sion­als. They coop­er­ate with other branches of med­ical sci­ence refer­ring patients to other prac­ti­tion­ers for diag­no­sis or treat­ment when appro­pri­ate. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors pro­vide patients with a truly inte­gra­tive form of health care.

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Guid­ing Principles

Natur­o­pathic doc­tors are guided by six prin­ci­ples which are the foun­da­tion of natur­o­pathic med­i­cine and out­line the natur­o­pathic approach to health.

The Heal­ing Power of Nature (Vis Med­ica­trix Nat­u­rae)

Our bod­ies have the inher­ent abil­ity to estab­lish, main­tain, and restore health. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors choose treat­ments which work to facil­i­tate and sup­port this pow­er­ful and innate capac­ity of your whole self to begin the process of heal­ing and pre­vent fur­ther dis­ease from occur­ring. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors iden­tify and remove obsta­cles to recov­ery, facil­i­tat­ing and aug­ment­ing this ordered and intel­li­gent heal­ing process in con­nec­tion with nature.

First, Do No Harm (Pri­mum Non Nocere)

Natur­o­pathic med­i­cine empha­sizes non­toxic, nat­ural forms of ther­apy and gen­tle, non­in­va­sive treat­ments. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors acknowl­edge, respect, and work with the individual’s self-healing process, and min­i­mize the harm­ful sup­pres­sion of symptoms.

Iden­tify and Treat the Cause (Tolle Causum)

In addi­tion to alle­vi­at­ing the acute and chronic symp­toms of dis­ease, natur­o­pathic doc­tors seek to iden­tify and remove the under­ly­ing causes and poten­tial obsta­cles to health. By apply­ing treat­ments to address the root cause of ill­ness, we help move indi­vid­u­als toward achiev­ing and main­tain­ing an opti­mal state of health.

Treat the Whole Per­son (Tolle Totum)

Rather than sim­ply address­ing a set of symp­toms, natur­o­pathic med­i­cine empha­sizes treat­ing each per­son as the unique indi­vid­ual that they are, acknowl­edg­ing that dis­ease affects the whole per­son, not just a spe­cific organ or sys­tem. As well, we rec­og­nize that dis­ease affects each per­son dif­fer­ently. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors take into account not only phys­i­cal symp­toms but also men­tal, emo­tional, genetic, envi­ron­men­tal, social, spir­i­tual, and other factors.

Doc­tor as Teacher (Docere)

Edu­ca­tion is power. The word “doc­tor” orig­i­nates from the Latin, docere, to teach. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors share infor­ma­tion and knowl­edge with their patients and the gen­eral pub­lic in order to encour­age self-responsibility for health, and enhance the health of soci­ety in gen­eral. We also learn from our patients through this process of work­ing together.

Pre­ven­tion and Health Pro­mo­tion (Pre­ventare)

Part of the natur­o­pathic doctor’s oath is a pledge to teach the prin­ci­ples of healthy liv­ing, thereby pro­mot­ing health and pre­vent­ing ill­ness. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors empha­size pre­ven­tion by assess­ing risk fac­tors, hered­ity, and sus­cep­ti­bil­ity to dis­ease and mak­ing appro­pri­ate inter­ven­tions in part­ner­ship with their patients to pre­vent ill­ness and pro­mote wellness.

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Natur­o­pathic Therapies

Cyndi Gilbert, Natur­o­pathic Doc­tor, draws from the fol­low­ing natur­o­pathic ther­a­pies to develop an indi­vid­u­al­ized plan of care:

Clin­i­cal Nutrition

Nutri­tion and the ther­a­peu­tic use of foods is a cor­ner­stone of natur­o­pathic med­i­cine. Food intol­er­ances, defi­cien­cies, dietary imbal­ances or nutri­tional excesses have been asso­ci­ated with many med­ical con­di­tions. Indeed, devel­op­ment of ill­nesses such as dia­betes, car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­ease, hyper­ten­sion, can­cer, and gas­troin­testi­nal prob­lems are known to be related to poor dietary and lifestyle choices. By chang­ing our diet and adopt­ing a health­ier lifestyle, we can often alter or reverse the course of an ill­ness and restore health. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors are trained in assess­ing nutri­tional sta­tus, and in rec­om­mend­ing dietary changes and vit­a­min and min­eral sup­ple­men­ta­tion where appropriate.

Botan­i­cal Medicine

The med­i­c­i­nal use of plants dates back to the ear­li­est civ­i­liza­tions, is observed in the ani­mal world, and is the foun­da­tion of mod­ern phar­ma­col­ogy. Herbs are used to nor­mal­ize body func­tions, enhance our immune sys­tem, improve diges­tion, heal and pre­vent ill­ness, calm nerves, relax mus­cles, cleanse, repair, and tonify. Botan­i­cals can soothe and nour­ish, while also specif­i­cally tar­get­ing bac­te­ria, viruses, and fungi. Plants can be used singly or in com­bi­na­tion, as: teas, tinc­tures, salves, poul­tices, cap­sules, oils, infu­sions, and more. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors are trained in the art and sci­ence of botan­i­cal med­i­cine, includ­ing herb-nutrient and herb-drug inter­ac­tions — impor­tant fac­tors in the selec­tion and safe use of botan­i­cal medicines.

Home­opa­thy

This pow­er­ful sys­tem of med­i­cine har­nesses the body’s abil­ity to heal itself. Based on the prin­ci­ple of like cures like, home­o­pathic reme­dies are care­fully cho­sen to match the total­ity of a person’s symp­toms, and pre­scribed accord­ing to strict home­o­pathic guide­lines. Home­o­pathic reme­dies are made from minute amounts of plant, ani­mal, and min­eral sub­stances in spe­cific dilu­tions. When care­fully matched to the patient they are able to stim­u­late the body’s innate heal­ing forces on both the phys­i­cal and emo­tional lev­els, with few side effects. Because home­o­pathic med­i­cines are ener­getic rather than mol­e­c­u­lar in their action, they do not inter­act with pre­scrip­tion med­ica­tions, and are safe to use with chil­dren, and with peo­ple who have frag­ile health.

Hydrother­apy

Hydrother­apy, the ther­a­peu­tic use of water at vary­ing tem­per­a­tures, is a non-invasive, eco­nom­i­cal and effec­tive means to stim­u­late the immune sys­tem, facil­i­tate detox­i­fi­ca­tion, man­age inflam­ma­tion, and influ­ence lymph drainage and circulation.

Lifestyle Coun­sel­ing & Stress Management

A cen­tral tenet of natur­o­pathic med­i­cine is the inter­de­pen­dence of emo­tional and phys­i­cal health. Our emo­tional under­stand­ing of our­selves and how we func­tion in our envi­ron­ment is an impor­tant dimen­sion of health, as well as a con­tribut­ing fac­tor in dis­ease states. Address­ing all aspects of a person’s life, iden­ti­fy­ing and address­ing the impact that stress and life events have on a patient’s health is an impor­tant facet of natur­o­pathic treat­ment. As well, natur­o­pathic physi­cians under­stand the impact that our phys­i­cal envi­ron­ment has on our health. Natur­o­pathic doc­tors are trained to coun­sel on diet, lifestyle, spe­cific stres­sors, exer­cise, and occu­pa­tional or envi­ron­men­tal haz­ards as an inte­gral part of the natur­o­pathic treat­ment program.

Tra­di­tional Chi­nese Med­i­cine & Acupuncture

The key prin­ci­ple that defines and con­nects all of Chi­nese med­i­cine is that of Qi (pro­nounced “chee”), or vital energy. The Qi of the body’s organs must be in bal­ance, nei­ther too active nor too dor­mant, for a per­son to be healthy. This Qi trav­els in merid­i­ans or chan­nels that lie just under the skin. A natur­o­pathic doc­tor will use east­ern herbs and acupunc­ture to assist the body in reg­u­lat­ing Qi and achiev­ing bal­ance. Acupunc­ture is the use of very thin nee­dles which are inserted into spe­cific merid­ian points. The prac­tice of acupunc­ture has been around for over two thou­sand years and for health con­cerns rang­ing from chemotherapy-induced nau­sea to mus­cu­loskele­tal pain, to turn­ing breech babies.

Phys­i­cal Medicine

Phys­i­cal med­i­cine offers treat­ment for many dif­fer­ent health con­cerns. Treat­ments can include hydrother­apy (the ther­a­peu­tic use of hot and cold water), sauna ther­apy, exer­cise pre­scrip­tions, and soft tis­sue work (includ­ing ther­a­peu­tic massage).

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Train­ing & Regulation

Natur­o­pathic doc­tors obtain com­pre­hen­sive and rig­or­ous train­ing, requir­ing three years of pre-medical post­sec­ondary edu­ca­tion, plus four years of full­time study at an approved col­lege of natur­o­pathic med­i­cine. In order to qual­ify for licens­ing in Ontario, natur­o­pathic doc­tors must suc­cess­fully com­plete the Natur­o­pathic Physi­cians Licens­ing Exam­i­na­tions (NPLEx), the stan­dard exam­i­na­tion used by all reg­u­lated provinces and states across North America.

Natur­o­pathic doc­tors are also required to earn con­tin­u­ing edu­ca­tion cred­its on an ongo­ing basis to main­tain their reg­is­tra­tion and good stand­ing with the provin­cial reg­u­la­tory body, the Board of Direc­tors of Drug­less Ther­apy — Natur­opa­thy (BDDT‑N).

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