Not everyone still appreciates or desires the commonplace ways that we approach medicine and healthcare in Australia. The chief method used for the majority of people is responsive healthcare that reacts to ailments and tries to treat them. A growing number of people are now more interested in the opposite kind of approach, where we take a more holistic approach and improve our lifestyle to the point where we rarely (if ever) get those same ailments.
To that end, people in Victoria, for example, are seeking out professional naturopaths based in Melbourne who can teach them more about this alternative approach to health and well-being. What benefits will these people access should they start with naturopathic medicine? It may not perform complex neurosurgery nor solve acute and emergency injuries, but it still has much to offer:
The Holistic Approach
First and foremost, at the core of naturopathic medicine is a holistic approach to understanding one’s health and well-being. Rather than just looking at something like cholesterol count, or the presence of a harmful bacterial infection, it will study your wider lifestyle and health and determine where you might be inducing ailments yourself through unhealthy living practices. So, it takes into account living conditions, diet, physical and mental fitness, and other factors to create a “bigger picture” of health.
The result of this approach is a more comprehensive and personalised “health plan” tailored to each patient and their needs. The plan will contain tips on daily exercise and meals, as well as how to better manage one’s stress or other mental health issues. Recommended physical therapies might include massages and similar treatments to help bring balance back to the body.
It Can Help with a Huge Range of Problems
You might have thought that naturopathy was focused on just a few fringe things, but is actually commonly used to help people with a wide range of health issues. These include headaches, obesity, digestive issues, pain management, chronic fatigue, fertility problems, allergies and more.
You should understand that it isn’t any kind of miracle cure for these issues and won’t necessarily help you more than conventional medicine, but many use it alongside their conventional treatment or as a follow up to their treatment to boost overall health, immunity and prevent any repetition of what was ailing them beforehand.
It Focuses on Prevention
The guiding philosophy of naturopathic medicine is trying to prevent health problems from happening in the first place, or preventing them from happening again. This makes for a less invasive way of dealing with health rather than responsively scanning, cutting open and medicating as is the norm for most people. By focusing our attention on prevention, naturopathic medical practitioners are helping people to be more health-minded, and to kick out this destructive habit of over-indulging and neglecting health first and worrying about dealing with the consequences later. Using this method, naturopaths are helping society to get a bit more right-headed and smart when it comes to well-being.
It Complements Conventional Medicine, Not Opposes It
Some are quick to try and point out that trusting our health to unproven naturopaths isn’t a good idea because it would mean sacrificing the very effective, high-tech treatments that are increasingly available in our existing healthcare institutions. This just isn’t the case. Naturopathic medicine overall can work in conjunction with regular medicine and doesn’t have to be a zero-sum game of choosing one or the other.
Yes, there are some conflicts of which you have to be mindful, such as vitamin supplements interfering with regular medication. The overall picture, however, is a great relationship of complementing medical styles, one designed to prevent ailment and one on hand to assist in the event of acute illness, injury, or accident. It’s not a bad approach.
