The Mind Company services include in office, telemedicine, and medical housecalls and range from diagnosis, treatment, therapy and medication management for mental health needs, such as, Depression, Bipolar Depression, Anxiety, Trauma and PTSD, Schizophrenia, ADHD/ADD, Dual Diagnosis (Neurological Psychosis-Parkinsons/Dementia) and many other mental health issues.  We offer Cognitive Behavioral Assessments and Mental Capacity Screenings.  We provide supportive Life Coaching to overcome marriage and family struggles, bullying, eating disorders, social anxiety, cabin fever, anger management, body image disturbances, coping through divorce and retirement, coping through the loss of a loved one and more.

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Integrative Medicine (IM) is healing-oriented medicine that takes account of the whole person, including all aspects of lifestyle. It emphasizes the therapeutic relationship between practitioner and patient, is informed by evidence, and makes use of all appropriate therapies.

 

Holistic Psychiatry values each individual as a unified whole, consisting of mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, social, and environmental forces that simultaneously and equally affect health and well-being.  A holistic Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner is trained in the use of conventional, nutritional/ functional/ orthomolecular medicine, and mind-body/energy medicine, to heal individuals at all levels of being, to restore a state of optimal mental and physical health, as naturally and efficiently as possible.

 

“Defining Principles of Integrative Psychiatric Medicine:”

1. Patient and practitioner are partners in the healing process.

2. All factors that influence health, wellness, and disease are taken into consideration, including mind, spirit, and community, as well as the body.

3. Appropriate use of both conventional and alternative methods facilitates the body’s innate healing response.

4. Effective interventions that are natural and less invasive should be used whenever possible.

5. Integrative medicine neither rejects conventional medicine nor accepts alternative therapies uncritically.

6. Good medicine is based in good science. It is inquiry-driven and open to new paradigms.

7. Alongside the concept of treatment, the broader concepts of health promotion and the prevention of illness are paramount.

8. Practitioners of integrative medicine should exemplify its principles and commit themselves to self-exploration and self-development.

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As you might be able to see now, the principles of integrative medicine apply equally well to physical as well as mental health and healthcare.

Let’s use this patient example to show how one could use a holistic and integrative approach to the diagnosis and treatment of a patient.

The patient is a 44 year old woman named Anna who came to see me complaining of depression. I take a holistic approach and ask Anna about all aspects of her life. I find out that Anna’s depression began after she was raped when she was 38. At that time she became so overwhelmed by what happened that she was barely able to sleep. Her entire health then began to deteriorate. Anna stopped dancing, which she previously enjoyed doing daily. She started eating lots of junk food and stopped cooking her own meals. She withdrew from her family and friends and eventually lost her job. Anna became very scared of leaving her apartment and hence had not gone outside in months. She was feeling overwhelmed and hopeless and even started having thoughts of death.

With this example, it is possible that an antidepressant medication may help with some of Anna’s symptoms. However, if that were her only type of treatment, there is a chance that her symptoms might not improve, and they could potentially even become worse. Utilizing a holistic and integrative approach to her treatment might look something like this:

• Engaging Anna in psychotherapy so that she could talk about her trauma and her associated thoughts and feelings

• Improving Anna’s diet to cut down on junk food and increase her intake of foods which have been shown to reduce depressive symptoms

• Helping Anna get back into dancing, which has been shown to have a variety of mental health benefits

• Starting Anna on supplements such as Omega-3 fatty acids to improve her mood and melatonin to improve her sleep

• Incorporating other treatments such as acupuncture or EMDR to help with Anna’s depressive and trauma-related symptoms

• Helping Anna to re-connect with her friends, family, and her community

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Utilizing this type of comprehensive approach is much more likely to help Anna, than is simply prescribing an anti-depressant alone.

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Another example would be the need to determine a definitive diagnosis of Parkinsons Psychosis vs Dementia-and Type of Dementia.  It is very important to ensure an accurate work up due to dementia versus delerium and the varied root cause of these diseases being very different.  The wrong treatment will harm not help your loved one.

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I hope this sheds some light on why we use a holistic and integrative approach with all my patients at The Mind Company.