In episode 59 of A Medicinal Mind: Wisdom and Wellbeing, I have an explorative conversation with my functional medicine colleague and dear friend Dr. Joe Mather.   Having connected with Joe, as a result of our mutual friend and colleague, Michael Ruscio, our friendship has quickly blossomed, bringing together two functional medicine practitioners seeking value based care and a critical eye to this new root cause resolution approach.    After sharing his story of supporting his mother with a functional medicine approach, Joe outlines the clinical importance of addressing foundational concerns with all of his functional medicine patients, regardless of the overt presenting symptoms.   Outlining skin rashes, IBS and joint pain as the most common presenting conditions he’s seeing clinically, Joe provides some insights into his clinical approach as to how he is determining the root level of  dysfunction in these myriad of conditions.   Digging deeper into how he’s addressing gut health dysfunction specifically, as well as the overall stages of his clinical approach, Joe gives us a clear and concise framework by which compromised gut health can be addressed without unnecessary testing, supplements and medications. Emphasizing the importance of addressing the terrain over the overt condition, Joe reports how he is preventing recurrence of conditions by treating the terrain over simply symptoms alone.   We then get into a thoughtful critique of functional medicine, collectively sharing insights regarding the strengths of functional medicine as well as some of the more controversial, misguided approaches such as food sensitivity testing, isolated genetic testing and expensive testing in general.   Moving further into the role of medications, Joe shares how he is moderating medication use, not completely eschewing medications in lieu of supplements and herbs. Giving examples such as genetic predispositions for lp(a) as well excessive supplementation, Joe shares how he is careful to utilize all available tools to address chronic health conditions.   We close the conversation with a thought experiment: exploring where functional medicine can go next so that we can address some of the controversial areas lacking rigorous evidence, all with the intention of increasing education as well as improving the gold standard of root cause resolution care.   I am so grateful to be able to share the work of another colleague who is practicing value based and rigorous functional medicine care.   Please check out the links in the show notes to see more of Joe’s work and how you can become a patient of Dr. Mather’s!   You can access more information and notes for this episode on our podcast page  https://www.amedicinalmind.com/podcast-wisdom-and-well-being/episode-059-joe-mather-md-from-family-medicine-to-functional-medicine-a-paradigm-shift-in-chronic-disease-care   You can see all of our content including blogs, poetry, meditations, and our weekly newsletter at our webpage: A Medicinal Mind   You can also follow A Medicinal Mind on Facebook and Instagram   If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe with Apple Podcasts and leave us a review. Your feedback and reviews allow our message and this space of nourishment to grow.   Disclaimer: The content at A Medicinal Mind and the content of our podcast are educational and informational in nature. They are not intended to be medical advice, spiritual counsel or a substitute for working with a health professional or a trained spiritual counselor. We cannot guarantee the outcome of any of the recommendations provided on our page or by the guests on our podcast and any statements written or made about any potential outcomes are expressions of opinion only.