Functional Medicine is the future of chronic disease healthcare
If you’re looking for help with a chronic health concern, and exploring approaches that genuinely help, you’ve likely asked: what is Functional Medicine?
Chronic disease isn’t the same as an acute emergency like a heart attack or a broken bone – and it needs a different approach.
So what is Functional Medicine?
Functional medicine is a personalised, evidence-based, science-driven way of working that’s built for the scale and complexity of modern chronic health problems.
It differs in key ways from conventional care for chronic issues, while working alongside it to deliver better, longer-lasting outcomes.
Apply for your free 15 minute Discovery Call with Dee Brereton-Patel now
Beyond Symptoms: Finding Your Root Causes
Personalised, root-cause care starts with one question: why is this happening – for you?
Chronic conditions are multi-factorial and highly individual.
Two people can share a diagnosis yet need entirely different solutions.
There’s no single pill or one-size plan. We map your unique mix – genetics, diet, gut microbes, past infections, stress, sleep, environment and lifestyle – the factors that often drive chronic problems.
Then we address the triggers and the pathways in the body affected by these triggers, not just the symptoms.
Ten people with gut symptoms may have ten different root causes; each needs an personalised, evidence-based plan.
What is Functional Medicine: systems biology, treatment beyond symptoms, and leaky boats
Functional Medicine can, in some cases, improve, halt or even reverse chronic health problems by addressing what drives them.
We look at the whole system: lifestyle and personal environment (e.g., toxins, pathogens), diet and nutrition, genetics and epigenetics, and how your internal networks interact – hormones, gut, nutrients, detoxification, immune function, inflammation and more.
This systems biology view helps us see patterns and choose the few actions that will make the biggest difference.
This is different to finding out that a condition exists and then prescribing medication to suppress the symptoms.
In functional medicine, we also value symptom relief, but we go further to understand why the symptoms are there and what needs to change for lasting results.
Or to put it another way…
Imagine that you’re in a boat that’s filling up with water.
A Functional Medicine approach:
- Employs specialist testing that discovers the cause of the water coming into the boat, in this case a leak
- Finds out where the leak is
- Identifies what caused the leak in the first place, which could be a complex mix of poor build design, weathering, lack of maintenance over the life of the boat, or a specific event
- Stops the leak and the cause of the leak so the boat doesn’t fill with water again
In chronic disease, a conventional medicine approach:
- Focuses on the fact that the boat is filling with water (the symptom: the end result of the leak)
- Focuses on removing the water from the boat (fixing the symptom, but not fixing the leak itself, or the cause of the leak)
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When diagnostic tools aren't well-matched to complex, chronic problems, can lead to:
> overlooking that a 'leak' exists (false negative)
> misidentifying the nature of the 'leak'
> applying short-term measures that ease symptoms but don't address the cause (and can sometimes create new issues) - And a huge team of experts will form a whole industry, spending their time and money developing amazing new technologies to evaporate the water, pump the water out, absorb the water, and build amazing facilities where the boat can be scanned, re-engineered, and sent back out to sea
But despite best efforts, the leak can persist if the underlying causes aren’t fully resolved.
As you can see, unless you fix the leak and address the causes of the leak happening, it’ll keep getting worse over the years.
In the end, despite huge teams of people trying to take water out of the boat as the leak gets worse and it comes in faster and faster, the boat will eventually become overwhelmed and will sink.
You wouldn’t fix a boat like this, so why would you fix yourself this way?
How Functional Medicine Helps Across Many Conditions
This is a really important question. To understand how functional medicine can help, think systems biology – the body as interconnected networks.
Rather than chasing isolated symptoms, we assess and rebalance whole systems, such as hormones, the gut and microbiome, nutrient status, detoxification, immune function, nutrigenomics, inflammation, and relevant exposures (toxins, pathogens, stress, sleep).
When these networks are out of balance, they can produce many different – and sometimes seemingly unrelated – symptoms.
For example, thyroid dysfunction can show up as hair loss.
But thyroid problems can also cause all of these of other symptoms, too:
- Weight gain
- Difficulty losing weight
- Fatigue, low energy
- Low mood
- Dry skin
- Hair loss - anywhere on your body
- Fertility problems
- Constipation
- Muscle pain
- Menstrual irregularities
Apply for your free 15 minute Discovery Call with Dee Brereton-Patel now
Because one root imbalance can drive many issues, restoring system function often improves multiple symptoms at once.
These systems also interact. Support the thyroid, and you may see knock-on benefits in cardiometabolic health; for instance, hypothyroidism is associated with increased cardiovascular risk.
Functional Medicine practitioners can be described as super-generalists.
We specialise in patterns across systems and deliver holistic, patient-centred care with a wide field of vision.
Super-specialists – for example, a consultant gastroenterologist – are essential for deep expertise in a specific area, and we can work alongside them.
In complex, chronic conditions, a systems-based generalist can help coordinate the moving parts, identify root drivers, and map a step-by-step plan. This way of working lets us support a wide range of symptoms and conditions with clarity and consistency.
How Coho Health can help you
We can help if you have an existing, diagnosed health condition (often that you’ve been suffering from for years) and want to pinpoint the specific root cause so that you are empowered to take control in employing an effective way of resolving or remediating it.
- If this is you, you might already have been prescribed medication, but want to know what more can be done
- You might feel that a conventional medicine approach hasn’t provided all the answers to your health problem, or has proven ineffective
- Or you might feel that right now you’re simply managing your decline, and things aren’t getting any better despite medication or other medical interventions
Our Functional Medicine team is always active in working collaboratively with your GP or Consultant, where appropriate, in order to find the most effective solution.
We can also help if you have a problem that has not been medically diagnosed:
- Where you’ve been to your GP, your test results have come back normal or inconclusive, but you still don’t feel right
- You don’t feel great and there’s something not quite right, but you’re not sure what the problem is
- You’ve done your own research, you’ve got a good idea what the problem might be, now you need expert guidance on the specific issue and putting an effective plan in place
- You want to pro-actively invest in your health and personal performance. You recognise that the absence of illness isn’t the same as optimal, bursting, vital health and happiness, and want to pro-actively invest in yourself and your future
We help by looking at all the possible causal factors at play, pinpointing imbalances, and developing a personalised strategy to achieve optimal health.
And whether you can visit one of our clinics or not, you can access our services wherever you are in the world through our virtual, online Functional Medicine clinic.
Working with our Functional Medicine team not only offers a powerfully different perspective, but also one of the most comprehensive clinical testing suites available.
We combine this with a range of options that are expertly tailored to your exact requirements and circumstances when designing the very best way forward for you.
Apply for your free 15 minute Discovery Call with Dee Brereton-Patel now
We hope this clarified what functional medicine is and how it could help you.
If you’re seeking a personalised, evidence-based path forward, Coho Health works in the UK, and worldwide through our virtual clinic.
Currently, around 90% of our clients work with us virtually – and many of the success stories on our website were achieved this way. Working with us online doesn’t change the quality of care or the clinical results you can expect.
Coho Health offers Functional Medicine in the UK, and to clients around the World through our virtual Functional Medicine clinic.
If you’re ready to explore your options – apply for a free Discovery Call to find out more.
We’d love to help you take the next step.
To your optimised, healthy future,
Dee & the Coho Health team
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