Functional Medicine for Top Autoimmune Doctors

Your body is designed to fight off invading bacteria and pathogens to protect you from developing an illness, disease, or infection. Your white blood cells are like generals in an army: leading the charge against invasive substances. Other tissues and cells, chiefly found in your gut, are responsible for protecting you from illness. 

This system of defenses is collectively known as your immune system. But sometimes this immune response gets imbalanced and off-kilter, resulting in autoimmune diseases. 

What is an Autoimmune Disease?

However, sometimes the immune system turns from fighting invading bacteria to attacking the healthy tissues in your body. When your body starts attacking itself by mistake, this is known as an autoimmune disease.  

Autoimmune diseases affect nearly every part of the body, from your digestion to your blood vessels. Alopecia areata, diabetes, Hashimotos, and rheumatoid arthritis are common autoimmune diseases you may recognize. 

Autoimmune diseases often attack the joints, skin, and thyroid. This may result in the following symptoms:

• Joint pain
• Stiffness
• Rashes
• Blisters
• Discolored skin
• Weight gain or loss
• Low energy
• Achy muscles

There isn’t a single clear cause for an autoimmune disease. Normally, autoimmune diseases are caused by a variety of factors. Some people are genetically predisposed to develop an autoimmune disease. But for most people, autoimmune diseases arise as a result of imbalances in the body along with environmental triggers.

Treatment from Traditional Autoimmune Doctors

After being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, most people seek out a top autoimmune doctor to try to reverse the symptoms of autoimmunity. 

Unfortunately, the conventional approach from most autoimmune doctors ends up looking like a lot of medication to manage symptoms for the rest of your life. That doesn’t sound like any fun!

Many folks walk away from their autoimmune doctor with no hope of full recovery and a big bottle of medication. We think there’s a better way of doing things.

The Functional Medicine Approach

You know how the saying goes: You can’t Band-Aid a bullet wound.

There’s a root cause behind your autoimmune disease, just like every other health problem out there. Unfortunately, most conventional autoimmune doctors provide “Band-Aid” treatment that addresses outlying symptoms, not the root issue behind your autoimmunity. 

The good news is: functional medicine is designed to get to the root cause of your illness. As functional doctors that treat autoimmunity, we don’t say “What is going to fix these symptoms?” but “Why are you having these symptoms?”

The root cause behind your autoimmune disease may be clear, or there may be several factors involved. The body is a system of closely interconnected parts, and digging into the root cause of your autoimmunity isn’t going to be a quick fix. However, our approach is much more sustainable and successful in the long run. 

You can expect to feel better soon after working with us, but our treatment won’t stop there. We want your body to completely heal from an autoimmune disease and come back stronger than ever before. 

How Functional Medicine Doctors Treat Autoimmunity

We have a clear process for finding and treating the root cause of illnesses like autoimmunity:

1. Getting Connected. We start by getting to know you inside and out: your current symptoms, health goals, health history, lifestyle habits, family history, and more. Nothing is off limits—we want to know all about ya!

2. Getting Data. Next, we utilize our cutting-edge technology and lab testing to get an accurate reading of what’s happening in your body. We may test for food sensitivities, stress levels, toxic exposure, hormones, and nutrients. These tests are designed to uncover the root causes behind your autoimmune disease.

3. Getting Your Plan. With the information we know about your lifestyle and from our test results, we’ll come up with a plan to attack that root cause behind your symptoms. This might look like nutrition coaching, supplements and mineral prescriptions, and additional therapy support. Our goal is to help your body recover from current symptoms and be better equipped to prevent illness in the future.

4. Getting Results. As we work together, we’ll monitor your progress with “health markers” that indicate if your symptoms are improving. This isn’t a “quick fix,” and we’re prepared to guide you every step of the way. That means making tweaks in your plan if needed, continual monitoring of your progress, and shifting our health strategy if needed.

Our top autoimmune doctors at Five Journeys are here to tell you that there’s hope for recovering from autoimmunity—not more prescriptions that result in a dead end.

Work with a Functional Autoimmune Doctor Today

Ready to get started with our autoimmune doctors? Visit our website to learn more about our services and get connected with our practice. Then, get ready to kiss autoimmunity goodbye and say hello to a brand new life!

Sources

What Are Autoimmune Diseases? Who Gets Them & Causes | NIAMS (nih.gov)