Combined health of the body, mind, and spirit

Throughout my medical career, I worked in a variety of hospital medical specialties, including obstetrics, acute medicine, neurosurgery, neurology, stroke medicine, endocrinology, general medicine, gynecology and finally palliative care. Literally “from the cradle to the grave”.

Very shortly, I found, that focusing on a narrow aspect of human existence, limits me as a doctor. As we are intimately connected to the environment, we came out of, medics need to take this connection into account when addressing health problems. In other words, we need to combine body, mind, and spirit treatments and tailor them to a patient’s life circumstances and expectations.

Working as a Family Doctor, I noticed that time and time again, I was consulting patients with chronic conditions, which could be prevented or treated with lifestyle modifications. These include obesity, hypertension, lower back pains, diabetes type 2 (and prediabetes), stress, anxiety, depression, cardiovascular disease and many more.

At the same time, I felt unprepared to help them. After years of medical training, my knowledge about nutrition, exercise, and psychological well-being was basic at best. More importantly, my own lifestyle was far from optimal. Although I cycled every day I was overweight, my nutrition was substandard, and I struggle to deal with my stress and anxiety. Given this, any advice given to my patients would be hypocritical.

At this point, I decided to devote my career to lifestyle and functional. I decided to start with myself – I began to balance my nutrition, cycle less (exercise like anything else in life requires moderation) and practice mindfulness. The effects were amazing – not only I lost weight and feel more energetic, but I genuinely enjoy every moment of my existence. I feel alive. I would love for my patients to experience the same feeling.