Addressing Chronic Disease - I believe that most health conditions are caused by a variety of interconnecting factors, including genetics and especially environmental influences, such as diet, exercise, stress, and toxin exposure. For example, autism is a complex condition affecting several body systems (e.g., neurological, immune, gastrointestinal), and seems to be influenced by multiple factors (e.g., genetic differences in detoxification ability, heavy metal exposure, infectious agents, allergans).

Going Beyond Symptoms - I take a practical, science-based approach to nutrition to help you to identify and address the root causes that affect nutritional status and contribute to illness. In practice, this means using a combination of dietary, supplement, and detoxification interventions based on the existing body of research and clinical evidence.

Restoring Balance - A key idea behind this approach is identifying and using nutrition to help you correct core clinical imbalances in the body created primarily by environmental factors, as well as by genetic predispositions, attitudes, and beliefs. These imbalances include those related to:

Oxidative stress Detoxification capability Immune and inflammatory function

Hormone and neurotransmitter levels Digestion and nutrient absorption Microbial levels

Such imbalances can both lead to and be representative of complex chronic disease. My goal is to use nutrition to help you to restore balance in these areas in order to achieve optimal health.

Recognizing the Individual - Since each person is biochemically unique, I try to personalize care to your particular situation, as well as to complement the treatments provided by your other health care providers. People may be affected differently by stressors such as poor diet or toxin exposure. In a dietary example, some individuals are sensitive to sodium, with even low intake contributing to hypertension, while others are not at risk except at high consumption levels. In a toxin exposure example, some individuals seem much less able to excrete heavy metals, which puts them at high risk of toxicity at even low exposure levels.