This approach prioritises the use of gentle, non-invasive, natural interventions returning the body to its state of health, before considering more aggressive or invasive treatments.
By starting with minimally invasive therapies, such as lifestyle modifications, optimising nutrition, ensuring adequate hydration, movement and where appropriate botanical medicine, naturopaths aim to support the body's innate healing mechanisms and promote overall well-being. Health is not viewed as only an absence of disease but a state of optimal health.
As the Therapeutic Order progresses, naturopaths may incorporate , or refer out to physical medicine, such as acupuncture or hydrotherapy, to address specific health concerns. These modalities are chosen for their ability to stimulate the body's self-healing capacities without causing harm or side effects. Only when these approaches prove insufficient in achieving the desired therapeutic outcomes do naturopaths consider moving towards more invasive procedures like pharmaceutical interventions or surgery.
By adhering to the principles of the Therapeutic Order, naturopaths strive to provide individualised, holistic care that respects the body's inherent ability to heal. This approach emphasises the importance of addressing the root causes of illness, rather than merely suppressing symptoms, and empowers patients to take an active role in their health and well-being.
1. Establish the conditions to health.
Remove Obstacles to Health: Set Strong Foundations for Optimal Health.
Naturopathic medicine begins by creating the conditions for health through focusing on lifestyle factors that contribute to our health and well-being.
This could involve:
Ensuring adequate nutrition
Promoting regular physical activity
Encouraging good sleep practices and ensuring adequate rest
Supporting practices like mindfulness and meditation
Ensuring adequate hydration
Nurturing supportive and positive relationships
Supportive environments
Note: to establish the conditions to health, we must also remove any obstacles, things that are preventing us from healing. This can be difficult, it's a process of learning and unlearning, questioning your current habits and whether or not they are serving you.
Making changes takes time and intention, shifting your habits to be in alignment with your goals and where you are headed is key.
2. Stimulate the Healing Power of Nature.
Sometimes, a long-term lack of a proper health foundation, genetic disposition, environmental factors, prolonged significant stress or long-standing, chronic disease can result in a weakening of the vital force.
All medical systems, traditional or otherwise have a name for this pervasive healing force.
In Ayurveda it is called prana, traditional Chinese medicine has Qi.
In naturopathic medicine this healing power is called just that, The Healing Power of Nature or, in Latin, the Vis Medicatrix Naturae.
This force is stimulated in a variety of ways, but mainly by using therapies that have a gentle stimulatory, energetic effect. These therapies act to strengthen the vital force, awakening its ability to heal the body. Therapies used to stimulate the vis include acupuncture, homeopathy, hydrotherapy, prayer, visualisation, journaling, meditation, mind-body medicine, yoga or Qi Gong, among others.
3. Strengthen Weakened Systems.
The third step is to support weakened or damaged systems with homeopathy, botanicals, gentle exercise, yoga.
Conditions to be treated at this stage could include hypertension, diabetes, digestive concerns, pain and fatigue. A thorough assessment of your overall state of well-being, pathology testing and biometric analysis is of great value, investigating to find the root cause and establish conditions for health.
4. Correct Structural Integrity
Correcting structural integrity has to do with encouraging proper alignment of the skeletal and muscular systems.
Proper alignment is supported through the use of spinal manipulation, massage, exercise, proper posture, physical therapies, acupuncture and stretching.
The importance of proper structural integrity can’t be emphasised more, as our alignment contributes to the way we feel by affecting our circulation and nerve conduction and by keeping our organs in their proper places.
Ensuring proper alignment is essential for health and well-being.
5. Use Natural Substances to Control Symptoms
At this stage of the Therapeutic Order, pathology is targeted with specific natural substances.
Naturopaths opt for targeted therapies using therapeutic doses of vitamins, minerals, essential fatty acids, prebiotics and probiotics, food prescriptions or exercise intervention to target the healing of specific organs or organ systems.
Prescriptions are tailored to the individual needs and treatment is evidence based and thoroughly researched. Education on how to follow the treatment plan and a schedule for accountability is set ensuring that you are well on your way to reaching your health goal.
6. Use Pharmaceutical Substances to Control Symptoms
The naturopathic scope of practice ends here. At this stage, patients are not responding to naturopathic modalities in terms of symptom management and in terms of the naturopathic scope of practice, when we recognise that a patient has reached this stage and would benefit from drug therapy, our job is to refer out. We can work along side pharmaceutical treatment to optimise the foundations for health, stimulate the vital force, support organ system-healing, correct structural integrity and naturally manage symptoms.
7. Surgical correction is reserved for the final therapeutic step.
This last stage of the Therapeutic Order is performed by medical specialists. At this stage patients have a disease that has progressed enough to warrant more invasive interventions.
When a condition requires these treatments, which do not facilitate healing but rather the removal of invasive disease, bodies can also be supported naturopathically : by supporting the healing power of nature, supporting organ systems, managing symptoms (or side effects of interventions) naturally and, eventually, establishing a healthy lifestyle foundation that will prevent re-occurrence of the same disease process.
If you made it this far,
Thank you for being here, I love learning and sharing this passion for healing and medicine, I believe particular medicines call us at different times and through following our curiosity and listening to our inner wisdom, we are led to the most aligned places. If you are feeling called to naturopathy as an interest in learning to become a practitioner, or whether you are being called to the medicine as a part of your healing journey, you are in the right place.
See you in the next post,
Chloe x
Comments