What is nutritional medicine, and what do alternative practitioners do?
Nutritional medicine is a discipline that is used in numerous medical disciplines. By changing or adapting the diet, the treatment or prevention of diseases is possible with the help of nutritional medicine.
Unlike the drug treatment of complaints, the change in diet is a natural form of therapy. Therefore, nutritional medicine is especially popular among followers of natural healing methods. In the following article, you will learn the most important things about nutritional medicine and its implementation.
Definition and areas of application
Nutritional medicine is, among other things, a component of the activities of alternative practitioners.
In their application, alternative practitioners use the current knowledge of physiology and pathophysiology of human nutrition – with the aim of treating, preventing or alleviating diseases or health complaints.
When you consider how many health problems can be traced back to an unhealthy or unbalanced diet, it becomes clear what an important role nutritional medicine plays. In this sense, we give some examples of the areas of application of nutritional medicine :
- Treatment of diabetes mellitus type 2 (diabetes)
- Treatment of lipid metabolism disorders
- Optimization of wound healing after surgery
- Prevention of cardiovascular diseases
- Prevention of cancer
- Therapy of high blood pressure
- Treatment of obesity and overweight
In addition, there are diseases (e.g. cirrhosis of the liver, renal insufficiency) in which patients have to adhere to a certain diet. Without nutritional medicine, it would also be impossible to determine the right diet for the implementation and accompaniment of drug therapies .
Treatment of type 2 diabetes mellitus through a balanced and low-sugar diet
There are different forms of diabetes in medicine. The best known are type 1 and type 2 diabetes mellitus. All types of diabetes are a metabolic disease in which elevated blood sugar levels occur.
The first type of diabetes is an autoimmune disease in which insulin, which is essential for sugar metabolism, is completely absent. In Germany, less than one percent of people suffer from the first type of diabetes. Far more common is type 2 diabetes mellitus, which can develop in anyone in the course of life.
The most common causes of type 2 diabetes are a possible hereditary predisposition, lack of exercise and an unhealthy diet. For example, those who consume little fiber and sugar frequently promote the development of type 2 diabetes over the years and decades.
Type 2 diabetes is treated by means of nutritional medicine. Switching to a high-fiber, balanced and low-sugar diet is a must in the treatment of type 2 diabetes. The earlier this change takes place, the better the chances of leading a life largely free of restrictions despite diabetes.
Treatment of obesity and overweight through calorie deficit and healthy foods
If you supply your body with more calories than it consumes through eating and drinking, you are building up fat mass. The steady increase in fat mass initially leads to overweight and, in the worst case, develops further into morbid obesity.
Even mere overweight, but even more so obesity, represents a heavy burden for those affected. Patients with obesity often suffer from high blood pressure, may develop diabetes and have a wide variety of physical problems such as hip and knee problems due to the stressful body weight.
As part of an individual diagnosis, the causes of obesity are determined. Based on the findings, a therapy is determined that definitely includes a change in diet . Sometimes even small changes are enough to achieve big effects. Reducing excess weight prevents numerous diseases.
The tasks of alternative practitioners
In nutritional medicine, nutrition is understood on the one hand as a supply of the human body, and on the other hand also as a therapeutic intervention. Thus, nutritional medicine also refers to healthy people. In all of this, alternative practitioners have the task of examining patients individually and obtaining information through conversations. They then determine the right measures to improve or maintain the health of their patients on the basis of current medical knowledge.
- Through individual nutritional advice from a naturopath, healthy people learn, for example, how they can optimise their diet.
- Subsequently, the right measures can be taken to prevent diseases.
In nutritional medicine, the activities of alternative practitioners must be distinguished from the activities of nutritionists. While naturopaths apply the nutritional knowledge disseminated by scientists, organizations and the government, the scientists are active in research , among other things. They are researching the effect of food on the body and developing nutritional therapeutic approaches. In research, nutritional medicine is evidence-based medicine. This means that researchers make an effort to make decisions and develop therapies whose effect has been empirically proven.
The BDEM website offers a good impression of the work of the nutritionists. The Association of German Nutritional Physicians (BDEM) is the largest association of nutritional physicians in Europe and worldwide. With the help of its website, it is easy to find medical practices with a focus on nutritional medicine. In addition, there are several opportunities on the website to obtain comprehensive information on the subject of nutrition.
Nutritional medicine pursues a holistic approach
In nutritional medicine, it is of central importance to take time for patients and to engage with them individually. This is the only way to ensure that all the connections of a disease are taken into account and that the right therapy can be initiated.
We have already provided information about functional medicine and the benefits of taking a holistic approach to diseases and health problems. Nutritional medicine meets the requirements of functional medicine and accordingly has an evolutionary potential: away from the cause-and-effect principles of conventional medicine and instead towards patient-oriented therapy.
Conclusion: Nutritional medicine as a link between medical specialties
Nutritional medicine combines a wide variety of medical specialties. Both in research and in treatment by a naturopath, the goal of nutritional medicine is to alleviate, cure or prevent diseases through an optimized diet.
Because nutrition is essential for the human organism and influences its processes in many ways, nutritional medicine offers the possibility of bringing about an improvement in almost all diseases. In addition to sick people, healthy people can also turn to a naturopath to improve the conditions for a healthy life by optimizing their diet.
