Why here, why now
Welcome to my blog!
It was about time that I found a space to elaborate on some of the ideas that I would like to share with all of you. Social media is a great forum, but it sometimes some thoughts need more than just 140 characters.
I thought I would welcome you all to my new website with some insights as to how and why I got to be at the place I am today: a medical doctor entering the world of naturopathic and integrative medicine.
Since I was a child, I never saw myself as anything else other than a physician. I loved science, biology, understanding the functioning of the human body, and uncovering mysteries. I thought it would be cool to become a medical sleuth — even though Dr. House was not around at the time. Interestingly, the humanity of the medical profession was rarely major consideration in my mind, although I did have a very humane and caring paediatrician who cared for me until I became an adult, and many examples of my mother’s colleagues who showed nothing but compassion and love for their patients.
Going to medical school was a very unique, exhausting and eye-opening experience as you may imagine. Yes, we were learning anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, how every bit of the human body worked and what happens when things didn’t, but in the middle of all this, very seldom the word “person” was mentioned. You learn to tackle diseases and medical conditions with the greatest of skills, but at the end of the day there was little instruction on how to treat, or how to address the individual in front of you. This is, after all, the paradigm that has advanced medicine to bring us the greatest of technology and scientific breakthroughs that the majority of us benefit from today.
Time, or lack thereof, in my view, is one of the main obstacles for doctors to establish a genuine and valuable patient-doctor relationship. Medical interns, residents, attendants, chiefs of surgical units, nurses, and virtually every health-care worker feels the pressure of time as every day goes by; more tasks to perform, more forms to fill out, more procedures to follow. Yes, all in the interest of patient safety and efficacy, but as the saying goes, something’s gotta give.
Taking a break from medicine, starting life in a new country and with a whole new world ahead of me, and eventually raising my own family radically changed the perspective I had on health, wellbeing and disease. From the disease-centered model I learned in Med school, I discovered there are so many factors that affect an individual’s well being, from food, sleep, daily habits, relationships, work environment, stress levels, exposure to chemicals, sense of connection with our communities among others. Being now in the patient’s seat, or as a caregiver, was the perfect opportunity to explore how all these factors had a direct impact on our family’s health, and learning how each one of those is equally important to prevent disease from taking place, we started paying more attention and spending more time figuring out how to best support an environment of health and growth at home.
That’s when I learned about Naturopathic medicine. As a primary care system that uses natural means to address disease and restore health, I was quite taken by the fact that it emphasized on treating the individual through customized treatment plans, it incorporated health promotion as one of its main tenets, and seemed to create a more conducive environment for stronger relationships between patients and providers. Entering Naturopathic medical school was for me the perfect avenue to combine all the wonderful knowledge about disease and the understanding on the effectiveness on the different conventional therapeutic approaches I had gained through my own medical studies, with the knowledge on safe and effective natural therapies, traditional ways to treat disease, and a more in depth awareness on all the different determinants of health.
Through my Naturopathic medical internship, many of the expectations I had brought into the career were materialized. Patients and their relatives appreciated how I was able to bring both conventional medical and naturopathic perspectives to the table when having discussions about the different therapeutic choices or courses of action; I saw how powerful and effective the different Naturopathic treatment modalities were, and most importantly, I had an incredible opportunity to really get to know my patients and to establish true partnerships towards better health. One of the greatest realizations from this experience as a Naturopathic medical intern was that mental and emotional well being play a much greater role in our health and our bodies’ ability to heal than I had ever suspected. There is a saying in Spanish that goes “mente sana en cuerpo sano” which translates “healthy mind in a healthy body”; I would now argue that the opposite is also true.
This is the approach that I want to bring now to the public at large: a truly Integrative model of care where both sides of the equation are considered and have equal value. From the two perspectives that I now hold, I can help patients achieve the health goals they have set for themselves using natural means, but I can also recognize when a pharmaceutical or surgical approach would be better suited in any particular situation. My goal as an integrative medicine practitioner is to enable my patients to get to the levels of wellness they desire, using a patient-centered approach that considers their own individual preferences, through effective natural therapeutics.
Medicine has made tremendous scientific and technological advances to bring us where we are today. With the rise of more chronic diseases, it is time we recognize we need to spend more time with patients understanding which aspects of their health should be addressed in order to prevent or minimize the impact of these conditions.
This is why I am here today.
