This is opinion only. To many of us Freedom of Speech may not seem to apply to medical information. As laid out by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) in the United States, medical information and associated claims may only be  given with drugs that are “proven safe and effective” by the FDA. This information is available as they describe and allow it and they control it completely.

This column is not a substitute for sound medical advice, or is it meant to take the place of advice from your family medical doctor. This is not meant to help diagnose, prevent, or treat medical diseases as traditionally described by your doctor and as described by as the practice of medicine by the FDA and other United States federal and state governmental agencies.

I am a pharmacist, Naturopath, and Clinical Nutritionist. This means I have a Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacy and a Pharm. D., which is a Doctor of Pharmacy. I earned my degrees at the University of Georgia and Nova Southeastern University, two accredited pharmacy schools. I am a fully licensed pharmacist and I have a certification as a naturopathic doctor from a school that is not accredited in some states in which licenses are issued. The state in which I live currently does not recognize naturopathic medicine and therefore does not issue licenses. It is interesting to note that it used to recognize and license naturopathic medicine.

Old fashioned naturopathy believes that God, mother nature, the collective unconscious, or whatever created us  provided all we would ever need to heal our body - whether it comes from plants, animals, sunlight, water, or simply the proper amount of rest. That is all that is really needed to heal our bodies. Clinical nutrition uses basic science - physiology and biochemistry, to look at what might be happening at a cellular level in the body. They then analyze to determine what is causing the body to not work as well as it should—what caused the imbalance. Clinical nutrition recognizes there are millions of chemical reactions in the body that need minerals like calcium, magnesium and phosphorus, iron, manganese, and nutrients like amino acids and thousands of other components made up of carbon, oxygen and other elements. It looks to replenish what might be missing or imbalanced in the body.

For hundreds of years, pharmacists studied herbs and plants to determine their healing properties and to create preparations used to heal people. I truly consider myself a naturopathic pharmacist as I have studied for many years the pharmacology and mechanism of action on how plants heal the body. In addition, I am struck by how many of today’s pharmaceuticals actually utilize the chemical structures from plants but then add groups of chemicals to make them stronger and more potent, or even toxic. These often times unnecessary additions usually create harmful side effects that may hurt the body in the long term.

Today, herbs are sold under GRAS, which means they are thought of as a food. They are allowed to exist if no medical claims are made about them. Medicinal claims can only be made if they undergo millions of dollars in studies and receive FDA approval. I do not make claims about the herbal products on my website. I do write about herbs from a historical perspective on what they were “thought to be good for or used for in the past”. These statements have not been approved by the FDA. 

Medicine is a gigantic GDP item- it was  $2.4 TRILLION in 2007, or $7900.  

Unbelievably, it was not until a couple of years ago that pharmaceutical companies had to report negative studies. What that means is if their product killed people during the study phase, they did not have to disclose that information. Subsequently, if their product worked to the satisfaction of the FDA, they were approved and no one was the wiser regarding the path the pill took to the consumer. This could be a possible reason why some drugs in the recent years have hurt and even killed so many people and have been taken off the market.

 Historical textbooks, including the Bible and some of the most ancient writings known to man say there are many plants to heal the body. Out of the millions of years humans have been in existence it has only been in the last 100 years that the pharmaceutical companies started making chemically synthesized products and the FDA even came into existence.

So in the next few weeks and months I will blog about what I know and what I can share that I genuinely feel can make a difference in your life. Prepare for a beautiful journey getting to know your body and how it wants to work with Mother Nature. Do you really think she left us here without the tools and the knowledge to heal ourselves?