Functional Medicine is a modern, evidence based, patient centred approach to health management.  The aim of functional medicine is to determine the unique metabolic physiological and biochemical imbalances that may be resulting in the illness underlying a disease process.  The goal isn't to analyse the cluster of signs and symptoms to come up with a disease label or diagnosis, but to identify what systems of the body are not functioning optimally, and then ascertain what's causing the breakdown in this system. Once these processes are identified and restored, there's a greater chance of improving health outcomes.

 

If you're sick or suffering, then obviously you have lost your health.  Functional medicine isn't about diagnosing and treating sickness and disease, it's simply about improving health.  Functional medicine is not a panacea.  Improving health outcomes may not completely resolve all conditions, but it will certainly go a long way to improving quality of life.

 

Functional medicine utilises thorough history taking and state of the art functional laboratory testing to come up with non-invasive strategies to improve health outcomes.  Typically, this involves lifestyle management to lessen the load of cumulative stressors, with diet and nutritional intervention specifically targeted at restoring these aberrant processes.