WHAT IS NATUROPATHY?

Holistic, drugless, college-based

With this post we continue a series on medicine and place-based wellness. We are pointing to medical systems and individual modalities that offer to improve the health of body, mind, and/or spirit and that are most supportive of home-based healing and local economies. We review those which have some organized or structured level of acceptance in the U.S. through licensure or formal association.

One of these is Naturopathy, which was brought to the U.S. in the late 1800s, flourished in the 1920s and 30s, declined with the advent of drug therapies, and was revived again as a college-based medical discipline in the 1970s.

Today, America has a rich offering of Naturopathic Medicine which WebMD defines as “a system that uses natural remedies to help the body heal itself. It embraces many therapies, including herbs, massage, acupuncture, exercise, and nutritional counseling.” Clinical offerings might also include hydrotherapy, hygiene, nature, manual manipulation, homeopathy, and more. Prescribed practices for patients might include a natural diet, detoxification, exercise, and the use of nutritional supplementation and natural therapeutic agents. Naturopathy’s goal is to treat the whole person, remove root causes and strengthen the body’s overall terrain.

Licensed Naturopaths (NDs) are graduates of a four-year, federally accredited naturopathic medical school, of which there are currently five in the U.S. and two in Canada; they must also pass the Naturopathic Physicians Licensing Exam (NPLEX). Naturopaths can be found through online directories such as this one maintained by The American Association of Naturopathic Physicians.

Once licensed, a Naturopathic physician will choose to offer a selection of therapies and services, but no two clinics will be exactly the same. This means patients need to be knowledgeable, ask good questions, and be prepared to evaluate the clinic and practitioner just as they would any service. (We will suggest how to approach the search for a health practitioner in future posts on self-care and the healing process.)

One look into a Naturopathic Kitchen will explain the key value this medical approach holds for place-based wellness and why we include it as a medical option supportive of the Living Well Locally vision. The real foods diet prescribed by a naturopathic physician is most effective when the foods are fresh, nutrient-dense, and toxin-free. This makes them highly appropriate for local, regenerative agriculture, cottage food businesses, and home-based healing.

Medicine has a powerful impact on everything around it, from the health of people to the economy to the productivity of workers and success of children and families. When we think about our local community and the medical options it offers, most of us do not consider what it means other than treating our illness. But if you stay tuned to this series you may come to see medicine in a broader light, not simply as something you need when you’re sick but how it affects your long-term health, your functionality in your elder years, and the health of your community and country.

Consumers ultimately drive how medicine evolves. Enough Americans have been choosing and paying out-of-pocket for holistic practitioners for enough decades that our country now has a good selection of medical modalities from which to choose. We are fortunate that this is so.

Communities would do well to ask themselves what type of medicine and healthcare they feel will best serve their long-term needs. This would allow them to make well-informed, conscious decisions about the future of their local healthcare system, and even explore the possibility of health as an economic strategy.