Conventional (Corporate) Medicine is not meeting our needs. What happened to the ‘Art of Medicine’?

If you have recently been to the doctor, the hospital or a pharmacy, you have likely noticed that it is not always a smooth and efficient operation. People are waiting in lines for hours, even at the emergency room, Primary care providers and specialists are booked out for months. Some people don't even have enough strength or time to wait in line at the pharmacy and have to go sit down resulting in losing their spot in line.

And all of this is at massively increasing rates, insurance premiums, co-pays, and deductibles. Health Care itself is not affordable for average Americans. This is a crisis, and something needs to be done about it. However, we are not going to be able to fix the current system. People are going to have to begin to look for ways of Seeking health care outside of this current system.

The average primary care provider sees 25 people a day. The visit average from 8 to 12 minutes in length. If you have ever been a healthcare provider, and know what it's like to try to give your personal time and energy to 25 people in one day, you will know how exhausting it is. We should not blame these providers for being burned out, exhausted, and disillusioned. Suicide is very high amongst primary care providers. In addition, they are constrained in how they practice, in the sense that there is a protocol for everything, and if they stray outside of this, because their patient needs a personalized approach, they could get fired or even lose their license.

So we all know that these are not good parameters in which to practice medicine. There used to be a saying called the ‘art of medicine’. And it was a blend between didactic knowledge, clinical experience, intuition, and identifying patterns. And ultimately, knowing people."knowing your patients". To know one’s patient takes a long time: to know something about their environment, their family, history, their personal history, who they are, what they worry about, and how their body tends to react to things takes time, interest and care. This is what ‘Family Medicine’ used to be.

And this is what is healthcare looks like at Willow Holistic Health. We get to know each and every one of our patients, and take joy in doing so. We spend time with patients and assess for root causes. We try to avoid ‘downstream’ medicine.

If you are interested in returning to a sustainable, carrying healthcare environment, give us a call. 503-678-6269.