Digestive Complaints

“I look like I’m 5 months pregnant after eating a meal”

“I have a bowel movement every 3 days if I’m lucky”

“I have to urgently race to the bathroom or risk an embarrassment!”

We hear these complaints all the time.  Bloating, constipation, diarrhea, belching,  pain and/or relux are part of what we conceptualize as functional gastrointestinal disorders.  There are often no physical abnormalities found or serious conditions involved in these set of complaints.  The underlying cause is often tied to gut imbalances that are fixable (…or, to use the technical terms: altered gut microbiota, gut-brain axis disconnects, and/or immune reactivity).

Conventional Approach: Limited Options

A trip to a gastroenterologist may help rule out serious illnesses, but otherwise may not leave you any closer to resolving your discomfort.  For some, such a trip – which could include endoscopy, x-rays, and/or blood tests – may be totally unnecessary.

Our Approach: Analyzing the Complex and Re-Writing the Basics

The good news is that we can provide a path to improving your quality of life, eliminating the need to keep a place for “managing your tricky gut” on your to-do list.  We comprehensively evaluate your gut function and present a plan to address these issues. We concurrently utilize the physical exam (shockingly, an increasingly rare technique!) and targeted functional GI testing to confirm a diagnosis, and will work collaboratively to identify the right treatment path for you.  

Lifestyle and nutrition are foundational.  We appreciate how busy life is with managing professional endeavors, getting a workout in, and trying to be present as a partner or parent.  Accordingly, we will recommend ways to insert stress reduction that are manageable and yet pivotal to gastrointestinal health. We will also dovetail nutritional recommendations and identification of food sensitivities with our lifestyle work.  

At DCIM, our preference is to begin with the least invasive treatment, and prioritize botanical and natural options.  Of course, pharmaceutical treatment is also tool in our kit, but we reserve it for when it is necessary, or will lead to the best clinical outcome.

Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine asserted some 2000 years ago that the health of the gut was tantamount to the health of a human…..please, let us take his cue and pay it its due attention!