Medicine by numbers: treating the symptoms and trying to change lab numbers like cholesterol
Functional medicine: asking *why* the numbers and symptoms are there and treating the patient
Treating based off of blood work is a worthless game, using prescriptions or supplements to lower or raise numbers on a test does not equal health and is the reason so many people never have success with their treatments. I love evaluating blood work, using functional ranges to see what is actually going on in the body, but at the end of the day I will not treat to change a number, I will always work to find out what is behind that number and support that system.
Most commonly we are told that high cholesterol is the kiss of death and we need to lower it with medications and possibly diet. So we take medications or supplements that target cholesterol but never ask why it is high in the first place.
Is it because of a hypothyroid, liver damage, nutrition, blood vessel damage, insulin imbalance, the list could go on and on! But as soon as you are off the medication then what will happen? The medication didn’t fix the source so the cholesterol will go back up and the original system that wasn’t functioning will still be damaged.
Same with women who are put on birth control to manage symptoms. They feel amazing while on the pill, their periods are lighter, but you can’t be on birth control forever. As soon as they stop the pill their symptoms come back, typically worse than they ever experienced before because the original source and cause of their imbalances was never addressed and only worsened over time.
True health may take some time but if you’re finding that no matter what you are trying nothing is helping then you’re playing the numbers game. It’s time to start asking why you’re numbers are off and treating the true source.