FOLLOW-UP MEDICAL VISITS (30 MINUTES, 45 MINUTES, or 1 HOUR)
In conventional medical practice, follow-up visits consist of reviewing lab results and prescribing treatment, which is quite often a prescription drug.
In mindbody medicine, lab tests are reviewed and a treatment plan is developed as well, but is focused more broadly into the underlying causes of disease and consists of some, or all, of the following:
- Medications, herbs and other natural therapies as needed.
- Nutritional supplements designed to improve health and reverse the presenting medical diagnosis.
- Diet recommendations to improve common contributory factors such as insulin resistance, high cholesterol, excess body fat, intestinal yeast overgrowth, delayed onset food allergies, and more.
- Recommendations for stress reduction including reading, counseling, relaxation training, tapes, etc.
- Exercise training based on the individual abilities and needs of the patient.
Follow-up visits are used to monitor therapy and patient progress. Patients are encouraged to understand and change the lifestyle and mind style factors that led to the medical problem. It is not easy for many people to change their diet, begin to exercise and to reduce stress. These patterns of living develop slowly over time and are based on individual personality factors that originate in childhood. Nonetheless, these changes are the “message” of disease. As Norman Cousins wrote in his book, Anatomy of an Illness, “your body has been trying to tell you something and you haven’t been listening.” Therefore, patients are offered a variety of tools to help in nutrition, fitness and stress management. These include the following:
- Individual tools: educational handouts, recommended reading, educational DVDs and CDs, nutritional counseling, exercise training, individual sessions with staff psychologist or counselor,
- Group education: Shared medical visits (SMA), group therapy sessions for stress management, courses in stress reduction, courses in cancer prevention and other disease prevention.
Healing is found naturally within the wisdom of your body and the power of your mind.
