Unlike conventional medicine that looks for the cause after symptoms appear, functional medicine austin seeks to find out what’s causing your condition in the first place. It’s a more holistic approach to health, looking at your genetics, environment and lifestyle factors. It’s also about finding a treatment that will restore your body’s natural function and not just mask the symptoms. This type of treatment is ideal for those with long standing, confusing or debilitating health issues that haven’t been resolved by other treatments or medicines.
Functional medicine practitioners are medical doctors who have gone through traditional training, or they may be naturopaths or chiropractors with additional certification from The Institute of Functional Medicine. They’re able to look at your body as one integrated system, using blood tests and other diagnostic tools to uncover hidden metabolic, hormonal and nutritional imbalances that can’t be uncovered by standard testing methods.
The team at Austin Quan Yin uses multiple functional medicine tools to help determine the root cause of your health concerns. This is particularly important when it comes to autoimmune diseases, digestive problems or hormone issues as the cause can often be found in many different parts of your body. This is because all systems are interconnected and what’s happening in one area can be a result of causal factors from a completely different part of your body.
A key tool that functional medicine practitioners use is a detailed personal and family health history. This includes understanding the circumstances surrounding your illness and any other experiences you’ve had with your health. It’s essential that you are honest with your practitioner so they can get a complete picture of your health and wellness. They will use this information to help you identify and understand your underlying causes of disease and how best to resolve them.
At Nourish Medicine, Dr. Alex combines compassion and integrative functional medicine techniques to create a healing experience for her patients. She works with patients of all ages and has extensive experience in helping people manage chronic illnesses and reclaim their health. She’s the author of the bestselling book Bloom: 7 Steps to Reclaim Your Health, Cultivate Your Desires and Reignite Your Spark.
She’s a member of the American Board of Family Medicine and is a certified functional medicine practitioner through the Institute of Functional Medicine. She’s on a continual journey to improve her own health and has a passion for sharing her knowledge and expertise with others. She’s a founding member and active leader of Integrative Providers of Austin, a networking group for holistic-minded providers in the community. She’s also a regular contributor to various websites, blogs and magazines. She’s passionate about making a difference in the world by empowering people to take control of their own health and wellbeing. She believes that everyone has the ability to live a full life of vitality, and she’s committed to helping people reach their health goals with the support of an entire community of like-minded healthcare professionals.