Dear Colleagues,

After more than thirty years of treating veterans, I have learned that we can’t simply throw pills and procedures at our patients’ problems. If we are to help them heal, we must go deeper. We must find out who they are.

So begins my recent essay published in Health Affairs. In this piece I had the opportunity to explain how integrative health provides the tools, teams and language needed to help heal our patients, our providers and the health care system. If you are a podcast fan, listen to the whole 15-minute article here.

I highlight the importance of going deeper to uncover what really matters to patients. I’ve spent the last year training other providers to do just this using integrative health visits. Practitioners working in oncology, primary care, neurology, and other fields are adopting or adapting these resources for their own diverse patient populations.

A LOOK AHEAD

My team and I learn so much from those we meet and use that knowledge to develop some exciting new resources and content. There’s a lot to look forward to including a new “What We’re Reading” resource for providers. For the last year I’ve been sending out a weekly curated reading list of journal articles to a handful of colleagues to help them stay ahead of current medical research on integrative health. I’ll soon be making that available to my whole community of providers.

CHRONIC PAIN CARE TRAINING

Last month, I announced the new professional development course on integrative approaches to pain management with Tufts University and the Center for Innovation in Family Medicine. Many of you took advantage of the Samueli Foundation’s generous offer of earning CME credit at no cost. Look out for new modules in 2020 with more innovative tools and techniques for you to incorporate into patient care.

BREAST CANCER MONTH

With it being Breast Cancer Awareness month, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention our resources on Integrative Cancer Care. My patient newsletter included a suite of materials on the topic. Click here to see the patient-focused content.

Until next month, I wish you and your patients good health.