Nutritional Therapy is a complementary healthcare discipline that looks to both optimise health and prevent ill-health by methods that address systemic physiological imbalance within the body.  Imbalance can take many forms, be it a nutrient deficiency or hormonal excess, but it is usually accompanied by symptoms that without the diagnosis of a condition can sometimes be unaddressed by conventional medicine.

Following the Functional Medicine approach these symptoms, together with any dietary or lifestyle cue, are mapped onto biological systems – the immune, nervous or digestive systems, for example – to explore potential underlying root cause and any predisposing or triggering factors. Personalised protocols, evidence-led with reference to the latest in biomedical research, are then designed to bring these systems into balance.

As part of this process, functional testing can be used to substantiate the protocol and guide progress; supporting a targeted strategy and the possibility to provide clarity around individual genetic predispositions.

Functional testing can typically include:

• Digestive & intestinal health analysis – beneficial vs pathogenic bacteria, parasitic infection

• Nutrient level assessments

• Hormone panels – stress / adrenal, reproductive health

• Cardiometabolic health

• Genomics – genetic profiling for susceptibility and nutrient requirements

• Food reactivity & Intolerance

Testing is carried out by specialist clinical laboratories or by your GP where possible. Whilst preferable, functional testing is not essential.

Read on below to see how Nutritional Therapy works in practice >>

Nutritional Therapy in practice

To illustrate how Nutritional Therapy works in practice, we can consider the familiar occurrence of fatigue or tiredness – whilst this is often temporary during any demanding period in life, ongoing fatigue may have an underlying cause:

(1) Nutrient deficiencies

Magnesium, iron and B vitamins all contribute to energy production in the body; a deficiency of one or several of these will impair your ability to generate energy. 

Deficiencies can arise from low intake (e.g. lower iron and B12 in vegan diets), a high need (stress loads require more B vitamins and magnesium), absorption capacity (compromised digestion will affect absorption of all nutrients) and genetic variants (e.g. common variants in the MTHFR gene will affect utilisation of folate/B9).

(2) Insulin resistance

The hormone insulin is responsible for signalling the uptake of glucose/sugar by the body to generate energy.  When blood sugar becomes dysregulated (commonly due to diet and/or stress) as is the case with type II diabetes, the body can become unresponsive to insulin and the ability to generate energy is reduced. 

A visual indication of insulin resistance is a carrying of weight specifically around the waist area, as is the tendency with ‘apple’ shapes.

(3) Cortisol/adrenal dysregulation

The hormone cortisol is associated with the management of stress by the body. It is also responsible for your circadian rhythm, the sleep/wake cycle where cortisol is naturally highest in the morning to stimulate wakefulness and lowest in the evening when preparing for sleep.

During persistent chronic periods of stress, cortisol production and circadian rhythm can become disrupted, resulting in low morning cortisol and depleted energy for rising, and high evening cortisol which will affect sleep and contribute further to tiredness.

Through the consultation process a detailed case history and analysis will provide direction as to a possible cause for the fatigue and build a picture of pathophysiology i.e. how imbalance developed. This may reveal one of the above scenarios or something more complex; in some instances there may be several contributors – nutrient deficiencies can co-exist with any hormonal imbalance of cortisol or insulin.

We will look to validate possibilities with relevant testing - Iron and B12 levels, and markers of blood sugar are regularly carried out by GPs. More specialist testing that involves digestive/absorption function and genetic predispositions will be organised by us with affiliate clinical laboratories.

Health optimisation plans are developed using research into the science literature, allowing us to use nutritional and lifestyle interventions at the forefront of clinical research.

For more information on the consultation process see here >