Lifestyle Medicine gets an allopathic nod

Percentage wise, there are few MDs putting their reputations on the line to stand up for integrative medicine. Mark Hyman is one of these few and far between, and here he reports on the American Council of Preventive Medicine (ACPM) Lifestyle Initiative Program.

"Lifestyle medicine is not just about preventing chronic diseases but also about treating them. It is often more effective and less expensive than relying exclusively on drugs and surgery. Nearly all the major medical societies recently joined in publishing a review of the scientific evidence for lifestyle medicine both for the prevention and TREATMENT of chronic disease. That report is called the ACPM Lifestyle Initiative..."

Within this initiative are the core competencies required for physicians to practice their trades while prescribing the appropriate amount of lifestyle changes for each patient. This increase in lifestyle change prescription will be huge for most doctors, as most of our doctors are MDs and most MDs dont learn the connection between diet, exercise, stress reduction, sleep, interpersonal relations, environmental toxins, spiritual practice, etc, during their lengthy course of study. Naturopathic Doctors (NDs) do, but they are only licensed in ~13 states, and most residents of these states don't know we exist because most insurance doesn't adequately cover our services.

Thus, despite the overwhelming evidence-based reasoning for using lifestyle medicine in the treatment of every acute and chronic disease, now approved by the conservative Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), many millions of people in the USA suffer or die unnecessarily because our doctors don't know how to fully doctor.

The title of Hyman's article on this topic is,

"Millions Die Due to Withheld Medical Treatment" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mark-hyman/millions-die-due-to-withh_b_705114.html , though Hyman acknowledges that most doctors don't have enough awareness of lifestyle medicine to prescribe it in the first place. They aren't withholding treatment, since they're not holding this knowledge in the first place. Yet our MDs make 6 figures yearly, on average, while our NDs barely make 5 figures on average -- when they try to be NDs. Instead, they involuntarily withhold their knowledge as most end up paying their bills via work as UPS drivers, nurses, cooks, massage therapists, et al. A modern day tragedy, affecting the well being of every human, every day...