Frequently Asked Questions

 Naturopathic physicians (N.D.s) are trained as primary care physicians with an emphasis on prevention and on uncovering the underlying causes of your symptoms. N.D. training takes place in four-year medical programs which include basic and applied medical sciences such as anatomy, biochemistry, physiology, minor surgery, pharmacology,and clinical and physical diagnosis. After completing a series of nationally-administered board exams, N.D.s are licensed as primary care physicians to diagnose and treat disease using laboratory tests, physical exams, and a wide variety of treatments. Our treatment modalities include not only pharmaceuticals but botanical medicine, homeopathy, hydrotherapy, nutrition, minor surgery, and musculoskeletal manipulation. We are family care physicians, skilled in treating both children and adults with acute and chronic conditions. We are also experts at providing true preventative care.

While other practitioners may give a natural substance to help with a particular problem, this is not our approach. Our focus is on you and not your symptoms. We use symptoms as a guide to discover the underlying imbalances to your health, then apply certain natural laws and principles in treatment designed to help you come back to balance within yourself. As such, we do not treat diseases; instead, we will help you to elicit a state of health and an understanding--or insight--of what contributes to health and wellness for you and what does not. Our approach is completely individualized: we engage in a personalized process of healing with each patient. The overall goal is to facilitate your path toward both the state of health and the life you desire.

Our physicians are uniquely qualified to guide you through your healing process. Our physician-owner, a professional counselor with extensive experience in the health care field, invited into Insights to Health only physicians demonstrating talent in both the medical arena and the human arena. As such, you can trust that your physician will be discerning, compassionate, and a skilled listener able to help you discover the totality of factors --past and present--influencing your health.

Symptoms are simply the signal that our body is out of balance. They are our body’s way of getting our attention, but they merely indicate that more investigation needs to be initiated. If we are satisfied merely with making the symptoms disappear, we have lost a valuable opportunity to look more deeply into what may be amiss. For example, young women with irregular periods are often prescribed birth control pills. This makes their menses more regular, but when they attempt to have children years later they may discover that their hormonal system is severely imbalanced. Did this begin with the birth control? No, it was present before (irregular menses) but undoubtedly the birth control pills exacerbated the original problem (even though the symptoms were “under control.”) Now, years later, the imbalance has become even more complex to sort out, and with the potential repercussion of compromised fertility. At Insights to Health, we see our role as to constantly ask “Why?” We want to help you discover why you have the symptoms that you do, and work to correct problems at their root cause, before negative consequences can occur--this is truly preventative medicine.

Creating health is quite a different approach than eliminating disease. In order to build health, you will be involved in an active process of facilitating the internal and external environments in which your health can blossom. This is a creative process and it is different for everyone. At Insights to Health, our role is to bring out the wisdom within you regarding what is most helpful for you as an individual as you regain and maintain your optimal level of health and wellness. Our goal is that you learn to come to your own answers regarding what is best for you--your own Insights to Health. At this level, we have found that patients become truly proactive and engaged in the healing process.

Our patients are women, men, and children from both the Portland, Oregon area and across the United States (for out of town patients, phone or Skype visits are available.) If you know someone who may benefit from our care, please refer them to our website or invite them to call our office.

The initial visit allows us to get you started on your path to health.  We interview you to find out what your concerns are, your past concerns and how those have evolved into who you are today. We then make an assessment, which may include pertinent physical exams and the ordering of necessary laboratory tests. We give you practical recommendations and treatments to improve your health starting with your first visit. All follow-up visits include a new customized treatment plan and individualized health coaching.

We employ a variety of therapies with each patient. Nutrition, botanical therapy, flower essences, homeopathy, cranio-sacral therapy, bodywork, hydrotherapy, and counseling are commonly used by our physicians. In general, our treatments are very gentle and suitable even for children, pregnant women, and very sensitive adults. Many of the treatments we use are from Europe and are specialized treatments each of our physicians has taken years to learn and perfect. Lifestyle enhancement, including daily activities designed to restore your health, is one of the most important and effective interventions we offer to our patients.

Yes, there are.  At Insights to Health we take this point quite seriously.  Each of our physicians has spent years studying and learning the research behind all of the therapies we offer and is committed to staying up to date with current advances in scientific understanding.  Furthermore, not only do we study the research documenting our treatments, but we also review the latest findings pertaining to conventional treatment approaches in order to best understand healthcare from all angles.  Most of our treatments have been researched and validated by rigorous scientific studies.  Some of our therapies do not lend themselves to being easily studied with conventional clinical trials, yet they have a long and very reliable history of effectiveness.  Furthermore, absolutely every medication and supplement we provide to our patients is backed by meticulous quality control practices to document its authenticity, purity and safety.  We place a premium on this kind of tracking and we only prescribe medications and supplements manufactured by companies who are committed to meeting our highest standards.

Yes, we communicate with MDs, DOs, and other healthcare professionals with the goal of enhancing your care.

Many of our patients are taking medications when they begin working with our physicians. Since our work is based on restoring your health, medications are not a problem, and we will ensure that our gentle therapies will not interact adversely with what you are already taking. We find that when the body begins to right itself, most patients find their need or even tolerance for their medications decreases naturally. We encourage you to communicate with the prescribing physician regarding your long-term goals and progress with our approach.

We are open 7 days a week, excepting major holidays. Regular visits are by appointment only, but if you have an immediate concern arise, call us and we will do our best to accommodate you.Monday to Thursday: 9:30 am to 5:00 pmFriday: 9:30 AM to 3:00 PM Evening appointments available on Wednesday.

We are in network with Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Aetna, Providence, and Healthnet.  Many other plans have out-of-network Naturopathic benefits which will cover the majority of fees.  Some patients use health savings accounts (HSAs) instead of insurance as they have high deductibles or their insurance does not cover our services.  If you have out-of-network coverage we can either bill for you as a courtesy, or give you a time-of-service discount if you wish to submit to your insurance directly.  Toward this end, upon completion of your visit, we provide information for you to submit to your insurance company for reimbursement. We are happy to verify coverage for you.  Simply call the office at 503.501.5001 and our receptionist will assist you.

At Insights to Health, we see our approach to practice as a very important part of the solution to the problem of ever-increasing healthcare costs in the United States.  Public health research overwhelmingly supports disease prevention as the most effective and economical strategy bar none both to decrease individual out-of-pocket medical expenditures and enhance quality of life.  It is easy to understand why, for we all know that it is almost always simpler to nip a problem in the bud before it grows complex and entrenched.

Regular attention to your body’s health needs is hands-down the best strategy both for keeping total healthcare costs reasonable over time and ensuring that you are as vital and healthy as you can possibly be.  This is why the approach we take to symptoms is so very important.  By always striving to understand and correct the deeper disturbances underlying them, we are aggressively working to prevent more serious diseases from occurring as you grow older; it is not at all unreasonable to say that almost everything we do at Insights to Health is geared in some significant way toward the prevention of the chronic diseases that are so common and costly in the United States today.

Practically speaking then, we advise our patients to consider what they spend on enhancing their health as an extremely wise investment, one that will undoubtedly save money in the long run.  In most cases, it is advisable to prioritize this healthcare expenditure and consider utilizing your medical insurance not so much for your regular health maintenance as for protection in case of more significant and costly unforeseen medical events.  In this way, many people are able to raise their insurance deductible slightly, for example, and then reinvest the money they save on premiums with a far greater return in health over time into their regular efforts toward prevention and wellness.

 This depends upon the particular case but in general we say between 20-40 sessions. Using LENS, most patients report improvements within 4-5 sessions. 

 Neurofeedback can help a variety of conditions that arise from central nervous system imbalance including insomnia, depression, anxiety, chronic pain, fibromyalgia, migraine headaches, attention deficit, and multiple sclerosis to name a few. It doesn't help everyone with that particular condition but because we are Naturopathic Physicians we can look at other causes of your imbalance and treat in other ways.