Category
Practice Management
ADAPT Student Spotlight #4
A strong foundation in Functional Medicine—combined with an ancestral perspective—will dramatically improve your results with patients, open many doors for…
The Importance of Social Connection for Functional Medicine Practitioners
Close social connections matter for us as healthcare practitioners—in our personal and professional lives. Find out how to cultivate a supportive professional network in the realm of Functional Medicine.
What Successful Health Coaches Need: The 5 Cs
How do you become a successful health coach? By choosing the right training program. In this article, health coach Will Welch talks about the five Cs that make a successful coach—and an effective training program.
12 Time Management Strategies for Your Functional Medicine Practice
Effective time management strategies can help you run your Functional Medicine practice—without running yourself into the ground. Here’s how to find the time to make a big difference in the world without compromising your health.
Colon Cancer Screening: What Are the Options?
Colon cancer is currently one of the most common cancers in the United States, superseded only by breast, lung, and prostate cancer. (1) Screening is crucial for helping doctors detect colon cancer in its early stages, when it is more treatable. However, there is significant controversy over what constitutes the best colon cancer screening method, and research shows that doctors are failing to provide their patients with balanced information about all the screening options, thus preventing patients from making informed decisions. (2) Read on to learn about the pros and cons of the available colon cancer screening methods and how you can help your patients determine the best screening type for their unique needs.
The Epidemic of Physician Burnout
Shocking new statistics indicate that more than 50 percent of physicians suffer from burnout. Physician burnout significantly reduces the quality of life of physicians and has serious implications for patients. Read on to learn about the causes and consequences of physician burnout and how a collaborative, functional approach to healthcare can help physicians recover from burnout and reclaim their passion for medicine.
How to Critically Read a Research Study
As clinicians, it’s vital that we stay current with the literature. Countless scholarly articles are published every day, and it’s important that we are able to critically analyze and integrate relevant new information into practice. Read on to learn two different approaches to reading a scientific paper.
Staffing Recommendations for a Modern Functional Medicine Office
Are you just starting up a practice or looking to cut costs in your current practice? Learn about the benefits of a lean practice model and get my best tips for staffing a modern functional medicine office.
Patient Communication Part 2: Communication Skills
Good communication is the foundation of successful healthcare. It has been shown to improve clinician–patient rapport, patient satisfaction, clinician satisfaction, and more. Despite this, most clinicians have little or no required communication training. Thankfully, communication experts Oren J. Sofer and Evan A. Wong have created a communication skills training program, coming out summer 2017, that I cannot recommend highly enough. It combines mindfulness and Nonviolent Communication—and is designed specifically for healthcare practitioners. Read on to learn why communication skills are so important and how this new program can help you master them.
ADAPT Student Spotlight #3
Are you a practitioner trying to transition to functional medicine? Or a health coach trying to deepen your understanding and increase your impact? In my ADAPT Practitioner Training Program, students have a wide variety of backgrounds. Take a look at what a DC and an FNP have to say about their experience adding ADAPT training to their practice in these two interviews.
Patient Communication: How to Provide High-Touch Care without Burning Out
In Functional Medicine, we want to offer more support to patients than they receive in the conventional model. You can get closer to this ideal without overextending yourself by working with allied health care providers, using a clear communication policy, and keeping all electronic communication in your electronic health record (EHR). Read on for specifics on how to organize patient communication to provide better care.
Why We Need Health Coaches and Nutritionists to Solve the Chronic Disease Epidemic
The incidence of complex, chronic disease continues to rise each year, and there simply aren’t enough doctors and other licensed clinicians to reverse the tide. Fortunately, a growing number of skilled and qualified health coaches and nutritionists are poised to fill the gap.
Batching: A Simple Strategy for Boosting Brainpower and Increasing Productivity
For busy professionals with heavy workloads, maximizing productivity is paramount. Unfortunately, today’s climate of hyperconnectivity and multitasking can have a detrimental impact on focus and performance. Read on to learn how batching can help you be more productive.
The Power of Placebo: Why Context Matters for Healing
The placebo effect is a widely accepted phenomenon in science and medicine, but its potential role in improving patient health is rarely addressed. This is unfortunate because clinical trials increasingly demonstrate the power of placebo (and nocebo) to drastically alter patient outcomes. Read on to learn the science behind placebo and how to harness its effects in your clinical practice.
ADAPT Student Spotlights #2
Practitioners from many different backgrounds are finding their way to functional medicine. In my ADAPT Practitioner Training Program, we have all kinds of practitioners: MDs, DOs, DCs, PAs, NDs, FNPs, NPs, RNs, LAcs, PTs, RDs, and even DDSs! If you’ve been looking for a way to improve your patient care but don’t see a clear path to get from where you are to where you want to be, take a look at some examples of how students in the first year of ADAPT made this transition.
ADAPT Student Spotlight
What is your vision for your functional medicine practice? What would you do with your new skills if you’d been through my year-long ADAPT Framework Level One training? A strong foundation in functional medicine—combined with an ancestral perspective—will dramatically improve your results with patients, open many doors for practice growth, and help you feel more engaged and satisfied with your work. I asked some current students in ADAPT to share how the training is helping them to accomplish their specific goals. Here are two of the responses (I’ll be sharing more in the near future).