There are a lot of different variations of Functional Medicine but what FM means at Active Edge is taking a look at your whole entire lifestyle, not just where you’re at right now. We look at:
This includes physical, chemical, emotional stresses, spiritual stresses – all should be addressed in a good, functional model. Functional medicine empowers your body to be as amazing as it was designed to be, by identifying the underlying cause or causes of your problems, and really addresses those issues.
Our methods are contrary to a lot of modern or western medicine which is very symptom driven. The symptom-based model is what’s found on TV with pharmaceutical commercials that have dozens of side effects. That’s what’s gotten us into the current healthcare crisis. Functional Medicine offers real solutions to get you healthy and your body.
You wouldn’t turn off the check engine light on your car without changing the oil. If you do, the light will come back on then eventually, the car will break completely.
The same goes for your body – whether your check engine light is chronic pain, fatigue, indigestion, constipation/diarrhea, blood pressure, or something else, let us help you figure out what is causing your issues so you can avoid breaking down.
Let’s solve your health so you can thrive and be “driving like new” in no time.
Functional medicine practitioners take the time to get to know the patient by first understanding their complete history, considering different aspects such as genetics, environmental factors, and lifestyle choices which impact health and contribute to chronic diseases. By taking this personalized approach, we are able to create individualized treatments catered to you which will help you discover, activate, and thrive.
Discover: Using bloodwork, diagnostics, and muscle testing, we can determine and identify imbalances, insufficiencies, and overgrowths.
Activate: After identifying what needs to be addressed, we will educate you on how to restore balance using nutrition, supplementation, detoxification, etc. and provide sufficient resources to support and empower you in your journey toward health.
Thrive: Once on track with your health and progress, we will remain available to support you long-term. This may involve a personalized nutrition and supplement plan or just scheduling visits as needed. Our goal is to educate you to the point where you can take your health into your own hands until you need us again.
Lifestyle medicine is the evidence-based practice of helping individuals and families adopt and sustain healthy behaviors that affect health and quality of life.
Dr. Hensel’s extensive knowledge of the body and the root cause of disease allows the combination of Functional & Lifestyle Medicine to be the best opportunity for patients to reach optimal health.
Taking a Functional Medicine approach is often the healing style of choice for people who have tried various other approaches to getting healthy and haven’t achieved the desired results. That can mean that your tests “look good,” but you still feel like something isn’t right. It can be that the treatment you’re currently doing isn’t working as well as you would like or seems to be bringing new issues. It can also be the right approach if you simply want a higher level of health, activity, and/or vibrance.
Some of the common struggles we hear from “healthy” people who could benefit by further activating their body’s natural healing potential are:
If you’re experiencing any of these symptoms and you’re ready to activate your body’s natural healing potential, functional medicine is a great option. Your functional medicine doctor will work with you to create a plan, reasonable for your lifestyle to help you reduce symptoms and restore your health, energy, and vibrance simultaneously.
Aside from hearing the carefree giggles of my children as they play, I find my deepest joy in restoring hope and light in others. We live in a world inundated with information, technology, and convenience. But along with that comes confusion, overwhelm, and toxic overload. Day to day life has come to feel like a daunting task. The question of how to eat, sleep, exercise, manage stress, maintain relationships, and survive financially seems to be on everyone’s mind.
I appreciate that we all want to be healthy but navigating the plethora of information that is out there can be overwhelming to the point that your success is decreased because you don’t know what to listen to. In addition to the sheer volume of info, there are a lot of conflicting viewpoints, and an approach that may be great for one person may not be the best for you. At best, health is confusing. Unless you have a good mentor.
I have been blessed with wonderfully inspiring and life changing mentors that have helped shape my personal life and practice. It is my goal to share that gift with everyone I have the pleasure of working with.
The typical western medicine approaches are reactionary to symptoms that occur, and most pharmaceuticals only address the symptoms and don’t actually fix the underlying problem. This is evident when you stop taking a pharmaceutical your numbers/symptoms typically return or are worse. A Functional Medicine doctor will address your lifestyle as the root cause of your problems and educate you on a multifaceted approach using nutritional supplements, dietary changes, and lifestyle modifications which will address the underlying causes of your health issues to fix the problem and not the symptom.
Lack of Standardization
Functional medicineemphasizes preventive care and lifestyle interventions with a personalized, holistic approach. That does not align with the standardized protocols and treatments covered by traditional insurance to treat symptoms or diseases. It makes it difficult to establish a one-size-fits-all reimbursement structure when plans for each person can be different.
Time-Intensive Consultations
Functional medicine consultations tend to be more comprehensive and time-intensive to understand your full health history, your whole body, and how each system works together, instead of 1 specialist for each body part.
Insurance reimbursement models do not adequately account for the extended time patients spend with functional medicine practitioners for the to learn root causes of your health.
Diagnostic Testing
Functional medicine practitioners often use specialized and advanced diagnostic tests to identify underlying imbalances. These tests are often not covered by insurance plans, even though they can be considered “preventitive” or necessary.
At this point, you are feeling better than you ever thought you could as you are feeling energized and thriving. You have learned a lot about your body, you are moving more efficiently, you understand your body’s cues, and you have a good idea of what to do with these cues. This means you get to try new things, achieve new goals, and conquer new challenges! As you do, we will be here as your resource, as needed, to help you nourish, boost, and refresh your health.
Pain is generally the last symptom to show up and the first to go away. This means that by the time you realize there is a problem, there has been a problem for a long time. Especially for chronic or recurring issues, understanding how you got to where you are is so important for getting to where you want to go. In this stage of your journey, you will resolve underlying dysfunction, remove cheats, and retrain habits. As we aid you in activating your body’s natural healing potential, we will help you regain movement, energy, and body function both inside and outside. Throughout this process, you will start to feel greater ease and inspiration as you restore communication and efficiency in your body. Together, we will constantly assess, observe, and reassess your body’s responses to boost your results.
You are your own person, with your own collection of life events which brought you to where you are today. You deserve to be heard, seen, and treated as the individual you are. Your journey begins with your Discovery Evaluation. This first visit includes your exam which works to uncover the root of your issue(s), new patient diagnostics, and, of course, your first treatment. This is how we will help you begin connecting the dots and feeling better. After your first treatment, we will ask you to observe your body’s responses– good, bad, or indifferent. There is no wrong answer as this is just starting point information and direction for moving forward. In your second visit, we will review this feedback and your diagnostics to further identify potential underlying causes and compensations. We will combine everything we have learned about you, consider your goals, and together create a plan to resolve your concerns from the roots up.
