The Integrated Pharmacist

Welcome to another episode of the Integrated Pharmacist Podcast. This is my first in a new series based on disease states rather than a specific modality or product. My goal is look at the major health concerns through the lens of complementary and alternative medicine and find evidence to substantiate that approach to health. I'd like to begin with diabetes. Diabetes is essentially the body's inability to deal with sugar. Often, the targeted chemical in the body is insulin. Insulin is like the key that unlocks the sugar gate to each of our cells. When it isn't working properly, sugar builds up in our blood where it can cause complications throughout the body. For patients with Type 1 diabetes, their bodies don't make insulin. Most often, this is because their immune system developed a response to the pancreatic cells that produce insulin. In other words, their bodies attack their pancreas to the point that they cannot produce insulin on their own anymore....

***Disclaimer: This blog is not meant to be used as legal or medical advice.  It is written as my person perspective on how medical professionals could blend western medicine with other modalities*** Ayurveda is the tradition of medicine that stems from ancient India.  As I mentioned in a previous post, there is an emphasis on one's dosha which is determined by body shape, activity, personality, and attitude.  Interventions are often tailored to the patient's dosha .  The tradition covers many aspects of medicine including surgery, but upholds the value of preventative medicine, and views strength as the ability to endure extremes.  Yoga is another big part of Ayurveda worth it's own blog post.  In this post, I'm going to focus on the herbs associated with Ayurvedic medicine. Because this is such a broad sweeping modality, it is difficult to define everything it should or should not be used for.  Like my recent post on aromatherapy, this is a subj...