Dr. Kyle Warren
Meghan Feir Walker
Have you ever had difficulty deciding whether to see an integrative or a functional medicine doctor? You’re not alone. In this article, I’ll run through a few differences between integrative medicine vs. functional medicine, so you can decide which route is best for you.
My personal experience with health problems
One of the most eye-opening moments for me was when conventional medicine couldn’t solve my problem, but a chiropractor did.
When I was around 12 years old, I developed a rash from chronic diarrhea. My parents brought me to the doctor, and their remedy was to give me cream for my rash. Yes, it helped the rash, but it didn’t solve the reason for the rash, which was chronic diarrhea. Why was I having diarrhea in the first place?
When we visited a chiropractor, they recommended I remove dairy from my diet to see if that would improve my digestive ailments. Sure enough, my diarrhea stopped and the rash cleared up.
That is just one example of how far conventional medicine can miss the mark. They often only address the symptoms with medication and don’t seek to understand why these symptoms are occurring.
Both integrative medicine and functional medicine have realized this approach isn’t helpful, which is why integrative medicine tries to take a more holistic approach by combining other complementary modalities.
Defining integrative medicine: A step in the right direction
Integrative medicine tries to combine conventional medicine with more holistic therapies. Whether they add chiropractic care, ayurvedic medicine, or traditional Chinese medicine elements to their practice, integrative medicine clinics offer some alternative, evidence-based options for patients that conventional medicine doesn’t.
Integrative sometimes utilizes acupuncture and certain exercises and emphasizes the relationship between modern medicine and different therapies to achieve optimal healing.
While integrative medicine is a good step in the right direction, in my experience, it's been a fairly small step toward progress.
Defining functional medicine: Obsessed with the root cause
When it comes to discovering root causes for health issues, I believe functional medicine goes further than integrative medicine.
Functional medicine has two main focuses: Discovering the root cause of a problem and understanding the body is interconnected.
I firmly believe that finding the root cause of your health issues will give you the best chance of getting healthy and staying healthy in the long run. If we can understand what's happening at a core level, we can be more successful in helping you achieve health.
I love that functional medicine trains us to see the body as an interconnected web.
For years, conventional medicine has divided areas of the body in a way that makes it seem like they are siloed. While it’s good to have experts in various areas, dividing these areas into specialties has also led to a large disconnect in understanding how the body works.
“The thigh bone's connected to the hip bone. The hip bone's connected to the backbone...” Just as that kid’s song suggests, the body is connected, and not just through bones, joints, ligaments, etc. What happens in the gut doesn’t stay in the gut. What happens in the brain doesn’t just affect the brain. This is why segmenting different areas of the body can often add blinders to doctors.
Orthopedic doctors don't think about the heart, cardiologists don’t think about the brain, and so forth. This doesn’t serve patients well.
Functional medicine emphasizes that the body is interconnected and that one problem can cause additional issues in other parts of the body.
Core principles of integrative medicine
- Patient-centered
- Personalized treatment plans aim to restore balance and function
- Takes a more holistic approach than conventional medicine
- Besides medication, integrative medicine can also utilize herbs, vitamins, and supplements
- Tries to incorporate evidence-based complementary therapies
- Often takes insurance (but not always)
One of the primary benefits of seeing an integrative medicine doctor is that you can often get portions of it covered by insurance. This means more people can access this type of care. It’s important to check with each clinic to make sure they will take your insurance as some integrative practices don’t.
Oddly enough, the fact that many integrative clinics accept insurance is also one of its downsides. Taking insurance means they can only flex the system so far. Insurance companies will only pay for certain things, so if they don't pay for it, integrative doctors are often prevented from being able to test in greater detail.
Core principles of functional medicine
- Patient-centered
- Aims to identify and address the underlying causes of symptoms rather than just treating the symptoms themselves.
- Analyzes the complex interactions within the body's systems to understand disease mechanisms
- Personalized treatment plans aim to restore balance and function based on genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors
When you suffer from long-term health problems, merely throwing medication at symptoms is not going to produce the best long-term effects. In fact, it often leads to additional symptoms.
You need to fix the core problem.
This is why functional medicine is so appealing to me and I hope to you. It aims to find the root cause of the problem, not just cover up the symptoms.
When my wife was sick, we could not find what she was sick from. She had chronic fatigue, abnormal neurological issues, and inflammation. I couldn't figure out where it was coming from. Was it coming from food, mold, or something else?
For several years, we were searching for answers, and we were eventually led to functional medicine.
In her case, her symptoms were caused by Lyme disease and other tick-borne infections, but because of conventional, poor-quality, outdated testing, I had written off Lyme years before.
Along with access to updated, more thorough, accurate testing, functional medicine helped me look at the interactions between the body systems and understand how the tick-borne problems were creating inflammation. This inflammation had been messing with my wife's blood flow, blood pressure, cognitive abilities, and ability to function. She had POTS, detox and chemical sensitivity issues, major digestive issues, bloating, and food reactivity, and her liver wasn’t functioning properly.
Once I understood that all of this was connected, I was able to create an effective protocol to get her healthy.
Potential downsides of functional medicine
The biggest downside to the functional medicine approach is the out-of-pocket costs. Because functional medicine isn’t covered by insurance, this can be a financial hit for patients.
However, the biggest waste of time and money is doing the wrong thing for years. This is why we place such a strong emphasis on using accurate, thorough tests that fit your unique scenario.
Functional medicine also requires active participation. To see results, you need to make healthier lifestyle choices and remember to take whatever supplements or herbs are unique to your protocol.
Which is better: Functional or integrative medicine?
The choice between functional and integrative medicine depends on individual health goals and conditions:
- Functional medicine utilizes advanced diagnostic testing to identify underlying imbalances and designs targeted interventions to restore health. This route may be more suitable for those seeking to uncover and address specific root causes of chronic illnesses through detailed diagnostic evaluations. I believe the more chronic the condition, the more appropriate functional medicine becomes.
- Integrative medicine combines conventional medical treatments with complementary therapies to enhance overall well-being. This route may appeal to individuals looking to enhance their overall health by combining conventional treatments with complementary therapies. This is a simpler approach but still more complete than traditional healthcare.
The conventional model alone isn't working, and both integrative medicine and functional medicine recognize that.
While both integrative and functional medicine offer individualized treatment plans, integrative medicine takes a more mainstream medical approach.
Function medicine has more leeway to investigate issues that slip through the cracks. I believe this is why functional medicine is the better route for those dealing with chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, chronic Lyme and other tick-borne diseases, various neurological problems, and other conditions.
The benefit and the downside of functional medicine is that it's generally not covered by insurance, but that gives doctors the freedom to delve deeper into diseases that aren't well understood by conventional medicine.
In our functional medicine clinic, we sometimes work with integrative medicine partners who can benefit our practice and patients.
For example, there is an integrative clinic that offers delayed vaccine schedules for parents who want to adjust the timeline for their children. Another integrative clinic offers hormone replacement therapy. This means that if you need prescription hormones, we have another clinic we partner with that can offer that.
In our current medical system setups, integrative and functional medicine can often work together.
Are functional medicine practitioners real doctors?
Within functional medicine, you'll find medical doctors, osteopathic doctors, chiropractors, naturopaths, and nurse practitioners.
A few different organizations offer functional medicine training.
Discover the right path for you
While integrative medicine and functional medicine can both provide answers and be extremely helpful for patients, my family and I found much greater success with functional medicine. It was focused on finding the root cause(s) of our health issues through more extensive assessments and testing.
I try to approach problems in my office through a functional medicine lens. This is one of the reasons we address the immune system, nutrition, and other areas that support the body as a whole when helping people with Lyme and co-infections.
Dr. Paul approaches gut health in the same way. He looks at how the gut affects the brain, how nutrients affect your skin, and how everything is connected.
In our clinic, we put a major emphasis on accurate testing. We don’t want to guess because that just wastes your time and money, making you suffer longer in the process.
At our clinic, Dr. Paul and I view testing as an investment and a fast track to your renewed health. We believe in the importance of running quality testing, whether it's to thoroughly check Lyme and co-infections, food allergies/sensitivities, microbiome health, micronutrient deficiencies, hormones, or otherwise. We try to narrow down which testing would be the most beneficial in your case.
If we understand the root problems, we can get you better faster. We strongly believe testing and not guessing is an important key to your success.
If you’re curious about how functional health works and how it can further help you, read “Test, don’t guess.”
Schedule your free 15-minute consultation
At Restorative Health Solutions, we offer individualized care and can help create a plan tailored to your symptoms and infections.
If you have chronic health problems, Restorative Health Solutions is here to help. Schedule a consultation with Dr. Warren or Dr. Paul to explore personalized testing options and protocols for a helpful and effective path to recovery.
Watch the video
To watch the video accompanying this article, click here.
Share the article and follow us on social media
If this article was helpful to you, consider sharing this with family and friends. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube for more beneficial health information on chronic tick-borne infections and other topics.
