ADD - ADHD

Our ADD/ADHD Health Assessment asks you questions about how the diagnosis was made, what symptoms you have, how you are managing your symptoms, and what can be done to treat this problem with and without drugs.  

ADD and ADHD are common diagnoses that now are reported to affect at least 5% of our children and many of these kids suffer from family or other social dysfunction that masquerade as these conditions. It is important to support our children with psychotherapy and general and targeted nutrition. While optimal nutrition with whole, unprocessed, unrefined foods without additives and preservatives is critical, there are specific essential fatty acids that are critical to replace to avoid biochemical defects that not only lead to the commonly appreciated symptoms of these conditions but also to the commonly under-appreciated findings that include dyslexia, dyspraxia, night blindness and dry skin. Obtaining an essential fatty acid profile is a good idea for everyone who has one of these diagnoses. 

Addictions

Our Addiction Health Assessment explores what you are addicted to, how your addiction affects your lifestyle, and what you can do to deal with it using mainstream cutting edge therapies and CAM treatments.

Ten percent of Americans are addicted to drugs, much of this is from medications prescribed by physicians. The usual typical programs for rehabilitation are largely unsuccessful. Before turning to medications to support chemical brain disease you may want to consider turning to supplements that can help. This should always be done under the supervision of a qualified health care practitioner. It is important to provide support with lifesstyle strategies as well as psychotherapy and targeted nutrition in any detoxification program.

Alzheimer's Disease

Our extensive Alzheimer's Health Assessment delves into how this disease affects your lifestyle, what drugs and supplements you are using to manage its symptoms, how thorough a work up was done to make the diagnosis, and how you can cope with this disease. 

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is like an electrical "brown out" that develops as energy production in certain brain cells begins to fail. Using nutritional tools makes it possible to resuscitate mitochondrial energy production and either stabilize or improve symptoms. Drugs are of known minimal value and they also have plenty of side effects. Lifestyle strategies such as mental and physical exercise can delay or prevent the onset of AD  and should always be part of an AD treatment regimen. It is also important ot know that there are many prescription medications that are "anti-cholinergic" that are discussed in the video below that can aggravate symptoms and should be avoided.

Anxiety and Stress

Our Anxiety and Stress Health Assessment will ask you questions about the severity of your symptoms, what supplements and drugs your using, why you are having symptoms, how anxiety affects you, and offers considerations for management.

Stress and Anxiety in the short term boosts our ability to cope with stress, but when it becomes longterm it creates major problems with our health. When we're stressed and don't have the tools to deal with it, we repress the situation but it remains in our bag of problems. This can lead to PTSD. It is possible to identify and re-address these problems at a time later in life when we might have developed the tools we need to resolve the problem. We discuss how this can be achieved. Unfortunately, in today's HMO medicine, we have turned to psychopharmacology rather than working through problems.

Arthritis

In our Arthritis Health Assessment we will ask you about the kind of arthritis you have, how it interferes with your lifestyle, and what you can do that is safe and effective to reduce or eliminate your symptoms. Mainstream and CAM approaches to treatment reviewed and discussed.

There are many different types of arthritis but all of them are caused and worsened by inflammation. It is important that we live a healthy lifestyle to reduce inflammation by insuring we eat a healthy diet, get plenty of exercise, sleep enough, manage our stress, control our weight and have a meaningful purpose in our lives. In addition there are a number of nutritional supplements that go beyond these important lifestyle factors that we can use to control the inflammation and pain of arthritis. 

Asthma

In our Asthma Health Assessment we will ask you about your present treatment and its potential dangers, lifestyle factors that are important in preventing asthma, the role of tests infrequently used in the mainstream that are very important in dealing with possible underlying causes for asthma, and a variety of possible treatments for asthma and other related autoimmune disorders that include hay fever, eczema, angioedema, and hives. 

Atrial Fibrillation

In this Atrial Fibrillation Health Assessment we will ask you about how often you're in atrial fibrillation, how you are dealing with stroke prevention through anticoagulation, how you are managing the potential rhythm disturbances that can result, what supplements might be of value in preventing stroke, and look at drugs that can cause atrial fibrillation. 

Atrial fibrillation occurs when the top parts of the heart, called the atria, beat at around 300 beats per minute and lead to ineffective contraction of the atria. This predisposes to clots forming in the left atrium that can break off and travel to the brain and block circulation and result in strokes. Anticoagulation is the treatment of choice but there is considerable controversy about how to do this. Coumadin, aspirin, Pradaxa, Plavix, fish oil, and nattokinase are discussed. Dr. Saputo recommends discussing the treatment that is right for you with your health care practitioner. This Health Assessment provides information about how you can match treatment to your particular situation.

Autoimmunity

In this Health Assessment we will ask you about the specific autoimmune disorder you have, what drugs or CAM approaches you're using, what options might be considerations for treatment, and explore what possible causes might be useful in management.

There is an epidemic of autoimmune diseases, the most common of which include hay fever, asthma, diabetes, collagen vascular diseases, and hypothyroidism. The causes of this epidemic range from heavy metal toxicity to drugs and environmental toxins. Our immune system attacks our tissues and we use drugs to suppress our immune system. There are other options for treatment that relate to GI immunity (leaky gut syndrome), lowering the antigenic load (discussed), preserving a high antioxidant load, balancing pH, and supporting a healthy lifestyle.

Back and Neck Pain

Back and Neck pain affects most of us at some time in our life and there is a lot that can be done to manage or eliminate pain. In this Health Assessment we will investigate what caused your disability, assess the extent of your symptoms, review the approaches for treatment you're using and offer a myriad of mainstream and CAM alternatives, and offer suggestions to manage any pain, disturbed sleep, stress, or depression that may be interferring with your lifestyle.

Breast Cancer

Once you have breast cancer you need to know the best strategies to slow down or reverse its growth. In Dr. Saputo's Breast Cancer Health Assessment we will ask you about the type of breast cancer you have, what treatment you've considered or completed, whether or not you're interested in CAM approaches to treatment, and important lifestyle factors that could have an impact on how your cancer will affect you. You will immediately be emailed back audios and videos Dr. Saputo believes will guide you to information that can help you manage your cancer and support the body's immune defenses.

There is a lot we can do to prevent activating cancer genes and to protect us from developing breast cancer. Most breast cancers are epigenetic, not genetic!

Cancer

Once you have cancer you want to know what you can do to get rid of it and keep it gone! In this Health Assessment we will ask you questions about what treatment(s) you have undergone, which complementary and alternative treatments might be of interest to you, what lifestyle factors could help slow down or prevent a recurrence, and what you might want to consider if your cancer is causing pain or if your situation is terminal.

Cancer Prevention Srtategies

If you want to be proactive about preventing cancer this is the Health Assessment for you. We will ask you questions about lifestye factors that include your diet, exercise, sleep, stress, weight, exposure to sunlight, and exposure to environmental toxins and provide you with information that can help you maximize your body's ability to defend against cancer. Cancer is more of an epigenetic than genetic disease and most of it is preventable!

Cholesterol

In this Health Assessment you will learn more about what cholesterol is, why we need it, what its fractions mean, the safety of conventional statin treatment, nutritional therapies, the importance of a healthy lifestyle, how to treat abnormal cholesterol values, and who should use which strategies.

Depression

You will gain a much better understanding of how depression is affecting your whole self and about what your options are for treatment.

There are many factors involved in assessing what has caused depression as well as what can be done to manage it. This assessment begins with an analysis of lifestyle factors that address diet, exercise, stress reduction, weight management, and sleep, and goes on to include the challenges of dealing with the symptoms of depression through the use of nutritional supplements and pharmaceutical drugs.

General Wellness

Dr. Saputo's General Wellness Health Assessment asks questions about your lifestyle and its deficiencies, what physical, emotional, and spiritual challenges you are faced, and what you can do to deal with them using mainsteam and CAM approaches.

We cannot be healthy if we don't live a healthy lifestyle. If all of our cells are healthy it is impossible to be sick! So, our job is to keep our cells healthy by living a healthy lifestyle that includes diet, exercise, sleep, stress reduction, proper weight, and having meaningful purpose in our lives. If we follow these principles, our chances of sustaining good health are the best we can do.

Exercise

When you take our Exercise Health Assessment you'll answer questions about how much exercise you do, how intense it is, what your physical limitations might be, if you have an illness that can be helped by exercise, and coached (if you want) about nutritional supplementation.

While is is very important to consume the raw materials in our diet to produce sufficient energy (ATP) to be able to exercise, there are also particular nutrients that are important in enhancing athletic performance that can be obtained in special diets or with supplemetation. For optimal performance in sport it is important to prepare physically, biochemically, mentally and emotionally.

Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities

Modern medicine does not have very effective treatment for people suffering from the family of diseases that include fibromyalgia (FM), chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), and multiple chemical sensitivities (MCS). Mainstream treatment remains entrenched in using a wide variety of drugs intended to relieve the gastrointestinal, endocrine, immune, psychological, and neurological symptoms of these debilitating illnesses, but does not address their cause.

Our Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and Multiple Chemical Sensitivities Health Assessment will take a careful look at your specific symptoms, the drugs and supplements you may be using, and will explore any history you may have about trauma. It will also review possible treatments for these disorders and special tests that are not available in the mainstream that are very helpful in assessing and treating these challenging disorders.

Dr. Saputo believes these illnesses are diseases characterized by energy deficiency because of defects in mitochondrial ATP production. The supplements listed below are those he recommends to support ATP production and reverse many of the symptoms of FM, CFS, and MCS.

Headaches

Dr. Saputo's Headache Health Assessment assesses the frequency and severity of your headaches, possible causes that are often overlooked, the treatment you're using and what is possible, and what workup might need to be done to determine the best strategies to get rid of your pain.

Most headaches are relieved within five minutes (no this is not a misprint!) using infrared light therapy, although a few that are genuine neurovascular headaches are more challenging. There is usually no need for pharmaceutical drugs. If your life has been controlled by your headaches, this Health Assessment is a must for you!

Heart Attacks

If you have had a heart attack it is necessary to deal with the reasons why this happened. Our Heart Attack Health Assessment will explore this as well as managing complications, supporting heart nutrition, considering tests that are infrequently done in the mainstream that are very important for both treatment and for predicting future problems, and looking into disorders that can predispose to heart attacks.

It is still important to work with a qualified cardiologist to assess the complications of heart disease that include angina, congestive heart failure, cardiac arrhythmias, and factors related to disease progression. Dr. Saputo also recommends a complete integrative program that includes lifestyle, diet, and supplements to support optimal cardiac function. Mainstream medicine deals primarily with the acute defects in cardiac function very well, but could do much more to support the cellular biochemistry of heart tissue with these strategies.

Hiatal Hernia

Dr. Saputo's Hiatal Hernia Health Assessment investigates your symptoms, treatment, possible complications, workup, and offers nutritional approaches to managing this disorder. You will get instant feedback in audio and video that will educate and guide you to making wise choices about how to manage your condition.

Hiatal hernias develop when the opening between the esophagus and stomach is too wide and cannot fully close. This allows food in the stomach to regurgitate into the lower end of the esophagus and, because it does not have the protective lining the stomach has, to burn it with stomach acids. This can lead to "intestinalization" (looks more line the small intestinal lining) of the lower esophagus and an increased potential to develop into esophageal cancer. There are many ways to support healing of the esophagus to improve and/or eliminate symptoms and possibly lower the risk for cancer.

Hypertension

Hypertension is caused most of the time by lifestyle habits that can be improved to make a major difference in your blood pressure. Mainstream medicine looks to the quick fix with an array of anti-hypertensive drugs that can work, but at the price of a multitude of known and unknown side effects that can be disabling or even lifethreatening. Most people with hypertension can get off of their drugs if they will adopt a healthy lifestyle. Dr. Saputo recommends getting started with lifestyle, dietary changes, and supplements to start the process of lowering your blood pressure.

Dr. Saputo's Hypertension Health Assessment will determine first of all if you have high blood pressure and then investigate what you're doing to control it. Lifestyle strategies are very important in controlling blood pressure so we'll ask you about your diet, exercise, stress, sleep, weight, and meaningful purpose. We will also offer you suggestions for supplements that might be of benefit in your situation.

Hypothyroidism 

Hypothyroidism occurs when the thyroid gland makes insufficient thyroid hormone. It is characterized by slowed metabolism that is expressed by dry skin and hair, constipation, sluggishness, fatigue, weight gain and slowed concentration. In the video below, the condition is described and the physiology reviewed. The basis for the BioEnergy test is explained.

Dr. Saputo's Hypothyroidism Health Assessment will first determine whether or not you really have hypothyroidism. This can be done with great precision. Many people are on thyroid hormone and don't really need it. We will then find out what symptoms you're having of hypothyroidism and whether or not other endocrine problems such as adrenal malfunction.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD)

Most cases of IBD are associated with an imbalance of the microbes in the gut. Correcting this imbalance with natural microbes can have a profound effect on symptoms and recovery. Probiotics (friendly microbes) are a cornerstone of effective treatment, but there are many essential nutrients that support the natural healing process of the intestinal tract that are also valuable. This can be done in combination with drug treatment that may be necessary.

Dr. Saputo's Inflammatory Bowel Disease Health Assessment will assess your symptoms, the drugs and supplements you're using, the workup that has been done to manage IBD, and the extent of anxiety or depression you may be suffering from. Natural treatments are offered that can lower or sometimes even eliminate the need for pharmaceutical drugs.

Insomnia

A good night's sleep is absolutely essential for good health and most of us need between 7-8 hours every night. Lack of sleep leads to a state of inflammation and high levels of stress hormones, which lead to a wide range of diseases that include type 2 diabetes, hypertension, osteoporosis, heart attacks, strokes, cancer, obesity and much more. It also aggravates any health care condition we might have. In our fast paced lives we don't get enough sleep and many of us resort to using sleeping aids that cannot solve the underlying problems.

Dr. Saputo's Insomnia Health Assessment will explore the reasons why you have insomnia, evaluate how you manage insomnia, and offer suggestions for management that look at the underlying reasons and the tools you may want to use to deal with the symptoms.

Irritable Bowel Syndrome

Dr. Saputo's Irritable Bowel Disease Health Assessment will ask you about the severity of your symptoms, what you do to manage it, what tests you did to assess it, what associated bowel diseases you may have, and what you can do to manage this illness.

Most cases of IBS are associated with an imbalance of the microbes in the gut. Correcting this imbalance with natural microbes can have a profound effect on symptoms and recovery. Probiotics (friendly microbes) are a cornerstone of effective treatment, but there are many essential nutrients that support the natural healing process of the intestinal tract that are also valuable. Dr. Saputo recommends the following lifestyle, dietary, and supplement approach to help improve IBS symptoms and restore normal intestinal function. 

Lifestyle

Lifestyle is our most powerful medicine, is safe, and within our control to use. Even our genetic code, DNA, is clearly modifyable through lifestyle practices. Our belief system also has a powerful effect on our health; examples are provided. Phamacological drugs can be lifesaving, but compared to lifestyle medicine they are usually minor players.

Dr. Saputo's Lifestyle Health Assessment asks you about your diet, exercise, stress, sleep, weight, exposure to toxins, and meaningful purpose in your life. He will help you understand more about what you can do using lifestyle strategies to maintain optimal health.

Menopause

Dr. Saputo's Menopause Health Assessment asks you about your symptoms, treatment with drugs, hormones and supplements, and lifestyle factors that can be helpful in managing symptoms of menopause. Based on this information he provides audios and videos that will help you understand what can be done to help you manage this problem better.

Lifestyle that includes a healthy diet, exercise, low stress, adequate sleep, and weight management are keys to managing menopause. For PMS black cohosh, essential fatty acids, and neurotransmitter management with 5-HTP, St. John's wort, natural estrogens and progesterone can all help the symptoms of menpause. PMS and menopause are conditions caused in part by imbalances of hormones. Of course, an anti-inflammatory diet that includes foods with phytoestrogens and herbs and spices that help reduce inflammation can are also a good approach to managing symptoms fo menopause.

Osteoporosis/Osteopenia

Dr. Saputo's Osteoporosis-Osteopenia Health Assessment asks questions about your lifestyle, treatment with hormones, supplements and drugs, method of evaluation, and overall health. Dr. Saputo then offers suggestions to consider for management in audio and video that you can discuss with your health care practitioner.

Osteoporosis and osteopenia are treated in mainstream medicine with toxic drugs that are rarely necessary if we live a healthy lifestyle and make sure we have sufficient calcium, vitamin D, vitamin K and micronutrients in our diet. Osteopenia is not even a real disease because it describes those people who have a normal bone density. The use of bisphosphonates is highly discouraged except in rare situations.

Pain and Inflammation

Few of us are free of chronic pain and inflammation. We tend to rely on pharmaceutical drugs to relieve our symptoms, but this does little in the long run, and inhibits the healing process in the short term. Lifestyle medicine is the key to resolving inflammation and pain. Dr. Saputo recommends the lifestyle, dietary, and supplements listed below to support the body's natural and innate healing process.

Dr. Saputo's Pain and Inflammation Health Assessment will ask you about the kind of pain you have, how much it interferes with your lifestyle, and what you do to relieve your pain using both mainstream and CAM approaches.

Peptic Ulcers

Dr. Saputo's Peptic Ulcer Health Assessment takes a look at how your ulcer affects you, what drugs or nutritional supplements you are using, how you have been evaluated, and what complications of ulcers that you may have.

Peptic Ulcers affect up to 10% of us over our lifetime. Symptoms generally include burning in the upper abdomen, dull aching pain, and sometimes nausea and vomiting, especially if they are complicated by hemorrhaging or perforation of the intestinal wall. Peptic ulcers occur in the esophagus, stomach and duodenum. H. pylori is believed to cause about 50% of all peptic ulcers, and 50% of the population carry H.pylori. NSAIDS including aspirin are also common causes of ulcers.

Treatment in mainstream medicine is oriented to using two antibiotics and blocking acid production with powerful proton pump inhibitors such as Nexium, Aciphex, Prilosec,etc, but over the long haul there are problems that can lead to osteoporosis and senile dementia.There are much safer and equally effective ways to manage peptic ulcers in nutritional medicine.

Strokes

Dr. Saputo's Stroke Health Assessment will assess your risk for stroke, the medications you may be taking for stroke management, tests you may want to consider to see if your blood is prone to coagulation, and the best way to prevent a stroke.

The cause of most strokes is the result of interrupted blood flow to the brain from plaque, clots, and bleeding. Transient ischemic attacks are often the warning of an impending stroke and they are a medical emergency. It is critical to maintain a normal blood pressure. The best treatment to prevent a stroke is a healthy lifestyle. There are a number of supplements that support healthy brain function and can restore circulation and normal blood thickness (hypercoagulation).

Type 2 Diabetes

Dr. Saputo's Type 2 Health Assessment assesses what you what your risk factors are for type 2 diabetes, what are doing to control your diabetes in terms of drugs, supplements, and lifestyle, and reviews medications that can predispose to developing type 2 diabetes.

Type 2 diabetes is usually a preventable and reversible disease once it has come on. It develops largely because of poor lifestyle habits related to diet, exercise, sleep, stress, weight, and toxic exposures (includes pharmaceutical drugs). While mainstream medicine relies mostly on drugs to manage blood sugar levels, all of these drugs have side effects, many of which are serious and even life-threatening. Dr. Saputo recommends lifestyle, dietary, and supplements as treatment for type 2 diabetes as strategies before using pharmaceutical drugs.

Weight

Dr. Saputo's Weight Health Assessment asks you questions about your appetite, how much you weigh, where you carry your weight, the role of stress, insomnia, and depression in your life, and what you are doing to control your weight. You will be referred to a myriad of audio and videos that will help you understand more about why you're overweight and give you suggestions on how you might lose weight.

Weight loss takes much more than will power. There are many reasons why people become overweight that must be dealt with in order to lose and sustain weight loss. There are endocrine causes such as thyroid, adrenal, and ovarian causes as well as diet, exercise, PTSD, insomnia, environmental toxins, many drugs, and quitting smoking that are involved in weight gain and loss. Many eating disorders such as bulimia, anorexia, are binge eating make weight management far more difficult to deal with as well.