If your car check engine light comes on, what do you normally do? Do you put a black piece of tape over the light? Would you pull the fuse that sends the power to the light bulb? Both would accomplish the same thing, making the check-engine light go away. If that was your goal, you are done at this point. But does the check-engine light come on for no reason or is it a sign that something is wrong within the car engine? If you continued to drive your car with a piece of tape covering the check-engine light, wouldn't you expect the car to break down at some point?

This is the way that convention medicine treats problems with your health. Having symptoms is like the check-engine light coming on in your body. Conventional medicine will try, with synthetic drugs or surgery (black tape), to minimize or suppress the symptoms. If you don't feel it or see it, then it must be ok. There could also be serious side-effects from these medications or surgery. Wouldn't you rather take your car to a qualified mechanic who checked and tested the car to find the cause of the problem, correct it and then let you drive on. The same is true with your body.

There may be serious underlying issues that cause the symptoms to appear, but just getting rid of the symptoms will not get rid of the cause! This is where Functional Medicine leaves conventional medicine in the dust! Reviewing patient medical history, having the patient do a comprehensive and detailed confidential/lifestyle form, prescribe necessary specialized tests (blood, stool, urine, etc.), check for nutritional deficiencies, get down to root cause of what is going wrong in the body. Then a life-plan is devised, nutrition is corrected, diet is addressed, exercise is introduced and done properly, lifestyle changes are implemented, toxins are removed from the environment and the body, mental issues are also addressed. When the root cause of a health problem is is found and corrected, the symptoms go away on their own. This is done naturally without drugs or surgery with comprehensive Functional Nutritional Medicine.

The question is yours and is very simple. Would you prefer to treat your illness or health problem with dangerous, side-effect causing synthetic drugs or surgery? This neither cures nor eliminates the root cause of disease. The other choice would be evidence-based, all natural, get down to the nitty-gritty biochemistry, detailed, root cause removing approach called Functional Medicine! We know what the obvious right choice is, choose Functional Medicine!

Dr. Mark Sielski, DC,CCSP, CFMP