Traditional Naturopathy draws on the healing systems of many cultures including ayurvedic medicine, traditional Chinese medicine, medicine of Native American cultures, European homeopathic medicine, and Greek or Hippocratic medicine.
For centuries these grass root traditional Naturopathic Doctors have been providing community-based care for a wide range of health problems. Today that legacy continues as neighborhood traditional Naturopaths render aid, promote health, and educate their clients.
This form of Naturopathy provides holistic health care by drawing from traditional healing systems. Its primary goal is to facilitate the body’s natural abilities to maintain or restore health. Naturopathy theory holds that physical, psychological, and spiritual elements in a person’s life all contribute to disease.
Beginning with a traditional Naturopathic examination, the practitioner uses a variety of analytic techniques, which have their origin in the Orient and Europe. Rather than the conventional diagnostic methods employed by Medical Doctors and Medical Oriented Naturopathic Physicians, traditional Naturopaths evaluate subtle energies the body produces rather than disease. Traditional Naturopaths take into consideration medications clients are taking, current health practices, and diagnoses provided by conventional medicine practitioners. In the traditional naturopathic exam the practitioner uses Iridology, muscle testing, bio-energy evaluation, oriental pulse, skin, and abdominal energy evaluation. Then, natural treatments are recommended based on the analysis. This evaluation considers a holistic approach to client care. Traditional Naturopaths treat the whole body not just the part that is ill.
Based upon the analysis, the traditional Naturopath recommends therapies that will not interfere with conventional medicine treatment but will complement and enhance its mode of treatment. Examples of treatments that may be recommended are: homeopathics, herbs, aromatherapy, acupressure, massage, reflexology, sound healing, shiatsu, guided imagery, chiropractic, colon hydrotherapy, Naturopathic manual therapy, acupuncture, or diet changes.
Traditional Naturopaths do not perform surgery, order conventional blood work or x-rays, or write prescriptions for conventional drugs as medical doctors or Pseudo-Medical Naturopathic Physicians do. If surgery, conventional tests, or drugs are necessary for proper treatment, they will refer their clients to another specialist. In some cases traditional Naturopaths, approved by the federal CLIA administration to perform lab tests, may perform or order functional lab tests. These tests are reviewed based upon the traditional Naturopathic systems theory which evaluates function not disease.
Traditional Naturopaths see themselves as natural health care detectives, searching for the cause and imbalances in the systems and tissues, of the human body, rather than prescribing treatment for symptoms as conventional practitioners do. Upon finding the imbalances, they work on healing the systems and affected tissues. As a result of examination and treatment, the client’s health and symptoms improve.
Traditional Naturopaths are considered general practitioners of natural health and treat a variety of ailments such as: arthritis, back pain, sinusitis, allergies, high blood pressure, eczema, memory loss, muscle injury, anxiety, fatigue, constipation, head colds, hypoglycemia, menopause, indigestion, shingles, and much more.
The traditional naturopathic community believes that natural health care is a separate and distinct profession, much different from conventional medical care. They believe that the conventional medical community has a different method of training in their professions and therefore should not be practiced by Naturopaths. Traditional Naturopaths believe they should not practice conventional medical care but rather they should complement it.