Nutritional counselling is aimed at general recommendations on the act of nutrition, from the choice of food to its metabolisation, taking into account the multitude of factors that can hinder it: stress, daily activity, access to certain foods, psycho-emotional relationship with food etc. In the Therapeutica concept we take these aspects into account, depending on personal characteristics and present dysfunctions.
Nutritional counselling is not a substitute for working with a nutritionist/licensed dietitian, but often unexpected results can be achieved with simple changes. These changes may relate to:
- Meal times (how meals are distributed throughout the day, and the time between meals)
- Certain food choices (often by tradition and habit)
- Taking meals at inappropriate times (e.g. late in the evening)
- Inappropriate food combinations
- Stressful mealtimes
Many pathologies (especially those related to the digestive and cardiometabolic systems) have an important nutritional component, and functional/integrative medicine practitioners place this nutritional regulation as the cornerstone, without which the therapeutic act simply will not bear fruit. For example, a chronic inflammatory process will not subside only if anti-inflammatory compounds (curcumin, boswellia etc.) are administered, as long as foodstuffs with a known inflammatory role (e.g. white flour, white sugar, fast food etc.) are present in the daily diet.
Realising this brings with it the desire and motivation to make small changes – which will have big effects.
Tofan Bogdan, MD