One Doctor’s Approach to Better Medicine
“Physiology before pharmacology.” I made this my motto over a decade ago to explain how I routinely help my patients heal from chronic illness.
The Medicine of the 21st century, the medicine I practice, is so much bigger than the terms integrative, complementary or alternative allow. I needed a better descriptive
Physiology is the study of how our bodies work, how we function and how we heal. To understand physiology is the reason I went to Medical School.
Physiology is my passion, my expertise. Pharmacology is just my back up plan.
Just to be clear, I do not reject pharmacology. On the contrary; I am grateful to have as many tools as possible in my toolkit. I will use whatever tools best suits.
I simply believe that before using medications, I have a job to do; I must carefully consider the underlying causes of each person’s illness.
We all know that our bodies tend to heal. Bruises, cuts, broken bones and illnesses most often heal on their own… but not always, and not always well. When healing is incomplete, Functional Medicine taught me to ask two important questions- What could be missing in order for you to heal or function better? What could be inhibiting your innate tendency to heal and thrive?
I consider your health story as a timeline; looking at this big picture, I look for connections and patterns. And I also look at the small picture, at your molecules, to assess your unique biochemistry. Some of the questions I ask: Are the basic nutrients you need to support your unique physiology all optimally present? Are there harmful or risky molecules that need to be mitigated or removed?
Many issues may be contributing to a person’s chronic pain or fatigue and many possible treatments, including medications, may be useful to help them heal. But first, I focus on optimizing basic Physiology: Give the body everything it needs to do its job well and remove everything that is interfering with the body’s innate ability to heal itself.
Nutrition isn’t Alternative Medicine – it’s basic Physiology
Each of our cells has work to do and they need specific molecules to do that work. The basic raw materials that our cells require to do their job are mostly nutrients from our diet. Nutrition is simply foundational to how we function, to how cells function, to our physiology.
I learnt about these crucial molecules several times during my education; the classes varied: biochemistry, molecular biology or cell physiology, but the cast of characters was always the same: magnesium, zinc, calcium and more; nutrients involved in every single chemical reactions in the body. Nutrition fuels the reactions of every cell so that we can live, grow and heal, create art or travel in space.
So how can Nutritional Medicine be considered Alternative or Complementary or even Integrative? Nutrition is basic to how we heal, it is basic to physiology.
We can continue to function with poor nutrition but we cannot thrive. We deplete our reserves and our resilience decreases, not to mention our muscle mass and bone mass. Sub optimal nutrition makes us age faster.
Chronic, low level nutritional deficiencies cause significant suffering and disease. The remedy is not pharmacology, the remedy is optimal nutrition.
Health and healing, is an expression of optimal physiology, and that is completely dependent on optimal nutrition.
There are certainly other necessary components to healing and vitality. Movement, connection, sleep and much more. But everything works better when every single cell we have, has access to all the raw materials it needs, to do the best job it can. That’s why I always start with fixing physiology. It’s often enough.
Functional Medicine is 21st Century Medicine. Personalized, proactive, empowering; I help people reframe their health story, addressing the underlying causes of their chronic symptoms. Along with the intelligent use of cutting edge laboratory studies to guide us along the way, we can co create an effective specific plan to correct the real causes of your chronic health problems. Visit or call www.tsachsmd.com
