Talk to me about functional/integrative medicine and health coaches...is this legit?
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Anonymous
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So, my sister who has cycled through a variety of careers already has decided that she is going to be a health coach practicing functional/integrative medicine. Yes, based on that first sentence, I'm already judging, but honestly, I want to be supportive.
So far, however, all of her facebook posts seems to indicate that she's pissing away tons of money on conferences on a variety of health topics some which sound reasonable and some which sound like bs to me. It's clear she's found a core group of people who are into the same thing and that she's feeling "energized" but it feels like this is one step up from a beachbody coach just more expensive for her to get "certified". She's not a doctor, far from it, so I feel like the the idea of her giving out serious medical advice is unethical. Am I wrong about this? Does any one in DCUM land have any experience with this sort of thing? I'm completely willing to take the mind your own business route, be she's so excited about this work that it's all she talks about now so it's challenging to ignore it. I did some brief googling and did find that there is at least one reputable university that offers something for integrative medicine so maybe it is legit and I could steer her towards that? |
Anonymous
| Integrative Medicine is definitely a real field. My doctor has an integrative medicine practice. He's the doctor you go to after you've seen all the other specialists and still can't figure out what's going on- basically the real life House.or you're tired of bouncing from one doctor to another and you want a doctor who will treat problems overall and as they are connected instead of piecemeal. His office is in McLean (Kaplan Center for Integrative Medicine.) However, I've not sure seen someone doing integrative medicine who is not in medicine already. Though, I've seen Duke has the integrative health coaching program. I'd say read more about it and ask your sister what she's planning on doing. My doc's integrative practice has been life changing for me with my chronic medical issues. I hope that this path ends up being good for her. |
Anonymous
| Thank you, this is very helpful. She is very smart, but definitely not a medical practitioner, she was an art major. At any rate, I'm glad to hear there's some legitimacy to this and I'll look into the resources you noted and try to steer her towards an actual recognized degree rather than general "certifications" which based on the reading I've done sound bogus and like a money making scheme. |
Anonymous
| I have a friend who is trying to do this without a related degree, and it's a disaster. Who is going to pay her for this unless she is a medical doctor or at the least has a real degree in nutrition. Unless she has someone to support her and is just doing this for kicks, it's a recipe for failure. |
Anonymous
| hahaha! an add comes up for this on this site. |
Anonymous
| Op, if it wasn't this, it would be something else. My guess is she's never been truly desperate/in need of money or she wouldn't have the luxury of what amounts to more of a hobby. |
Anonymous
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I am an integrative nutrition health coach. Ask me anything.
Functional medicine: only an MD can obtain this additional education Integrative medicine: these are the "healing arts" that are integrated with western medicine. Health coach from integrative nutrition: these are people who've experienced/studied using food to gain health |
Anonymous
| The only person qualified to give advice about the health benefits of food is a registered dietician so OP should still take some of the above definitions with a grain of salt. I am not one but every time I hear a trainer at the gym giving diet advice I want to smack him. The various training cert programs contain no diet/food component. |
Anonymous
Which means nothing. OP, your sister is just pissing away her life and not really committing to anything. As long as she's not turning tricks or doing drugs, I don't think there's anything to do. She'll be on to the next flavor of the month shortly. |
Anonymous
Ok, taking you up on your AMA. Is this your career? How much do you make annually doing this? What types of people come to you rather than a registered dietitian? What do you bring to the table that I couldn't read on the Internet? Genuinely curious. |
Anonymous
OP here, thank you for the distinction and for being open to questions. Based on the suggestions of others posters, I'm just going to let this go and let her life her life, but I do have questions and I appreciate the opportunity to ask them. Given your title, I'll assume you do not have an MD degree, do you have a degree in nutrition? If not, and I apologize for being brash, but I'm not sure how else to ask this, but why do you feel it's appropriate for you to give serious health advice? In particular, I'm struggling with how a non-health professional is qualified to give sound medical advice after attending a workshop for several days. I realize this may not be a pertinent concern depending on your level of training, but this is where my sister is right now. Are you able to make money with this career (assuming this is your full time career)? |
Anonymous
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This is not my career. I do coach individually. I also do group classes.
there are a lot of pretty famous authors and speakers. Some are hired by doctors or dietitians to help support their patients. dietitians use guidance from the usda to limit calories, count macronutrients and micronutrients, etc. A health coach is different in that they help individuals and families who want to change their lifestyle. Of course, if there were a perfect diet there would be no disease or obesity. So health coaches use what they learned at integrative nutrition to help people in a variety of ways: Low inflammation diets (heart disease etc) Transitioning to a Plant based diet healthfully Diabetes Gluten free Whole food diets Autoimmune disease diets Autism diets Our scope of practice is not to diagnose or treat. We often provide meal plans, goal counseling, emotional support. Functional medicine, though, is a true MD, as is a pediatrician or cardiologist. All of our training can be found on the Internet! Lol. But we heard lectures from the source. We learned about every possible diet out there. As a client, it's nice to ask a question to a coach who has experience vs. reading all the diet books, reading all the studies, joinubg support groups. As you know one diet doesn't work for everyone, especially "my plate" by the usda. So we help people find the diet that works for them. This usually means going back to cooking at home and eating whole foods. This is challenging for most so we help people find the tools to get to the next level. |
Anonymous
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We are not and should not give health advice. I would caution anyone who claims they could. My school was a year long program with credits given by SUNY.
As for your sister, it's not going to hurt her. She's probably enthusiastic because she's meeting like minded people who like to help others. Some will use the info for their own health, some will try to make a career out of it. But, it's like becoming s yoga teacher. It's good. It helps. People claim it changes lives. It's healthy. She is getting inspired and will use this info for the rest of her life! No harm no foul. |
Anonymous
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^^ yikes, there is no way in hell anyone without a license and a degree should be instructing someone in diabetes management. You can kill someone if you don't know what you're doing.
Shudder (medical person here) |
Anonymous
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Look, if you're making diet suggestions to a healthy person, that's one thing.
It's like a personal trainer at a gym. But the second you knowingly start giving nutritional advice to someone who is ill, and with a disease process you have only a very rudimentary understanding of, you have put yourself in a position of giving medical advice and could really harm someone. You can't mess around with blood sugar, for example. And actual Celiacs disease, to mention 2 of the examples above. Its the classic "you don't know what you don't know" that is very dangerous. This is why there are nutritionists with degrees and licenses. It's not as simple as you think it is. |