If you’re a WholeHealth Chicago patient, you’ve likely noticed that we review your list of nutritional supplements during each appointment. Conventional doctors ask what prescription meds you’re taking (and of course we do too), but virtually never solicit a list of supplements. Since our area of expertise lies precisely there, it’s important for us to know what supplements you’re taking.
What I’ve noticed (as have my associates) is that patients are often a bit disorganized when it comes to their daily supplement regimen. You might be missing one or two that we’d regard as really important just because you ran out and forgot to re-order. Or, just as bad, you’ve been wasting your money on some supplement of marginal quality that was praised to the sky by a health food store clerk. You’ve long forgotten what it’s for, but continue to buy it month after month.
You may even have what I call a vitamin graveyard on your kitchen shelves or in a medicine cabinet. You’ll recognize these products by their layer of faintly greasy dust, long past their expiration dates, and you wonder why you ever bought them in the first place (A late night infomercial? A former friend who went into multi-level marketing?).
Why we take supplements
It’s worthwhile to understand just why we take supplements, and this starts with dividing everything on your shelf into two categories. Group One is for health maintenance and disease prevention, Group Two is for specific health concerns.
Group One—Health Maintenance You should take a good general multiple vitamin to make up for the fact that less than 25% of us actually eat the recommended daily five servings of fruits and veggies. You also should be taking vitamin D since the sky is so often overcast and we rarely expose much of our skin to direct sunlight. There are a handful of other supplements I’d include in this category.
Group Two–Specific Health Concerns These supplements might include glucosamine/chondroitin if you have arthritis, St. John’s wort for depression, or berberine if you’ve got cholesterol issues and don’t want to take a statin.
WholeHealth Plans
Let’s limit this Health Tip to Group One so I can introduce a new system called WholeHealth Plans. The objective is to keep you regularly supplied with the highest quality supplements at prices that will definitely save you money. You’ll no longer find yourself running out of essential supplements. You’ll no longer waste time standing in the supplement aisle at Whole Foods reading label after label trying to decide if one brand is better than another
Each month a box will arrive with the supplements you need. We include the top brands carried in our Apothecary: Integrative Therapeutics, Metagenics, Xymogen, Pure Encapsulations, Thorne, and others, many sold only through the practices of healthcare professionals.
In addition to the basics, nothing is written in stone. Some of you have self-curated very sophisticated supplement regimens and you can add or subtract your own selections at very substantial savings.
And finally, since many of you now include intravenous (IV) therapies as part of your optimal health program, we’ve developed two additional plans that include our most popular IVs.
Here are the details
Plan #1 Total Wellness
These are the essentials, your supplement foundation. For $119 a month (and a 5% discount on all other supplements), we’ll deliver a month’s supply of the highest quality basics:
- Multiple vitamin blend (Integrative Therapeutics Multiplex without Iron)
- Omega-3 fatty acids (Metagenics Omegagenics EPA-DHA 1000)
- Vitamin D (Xymogen K2-D3 5000)
- Vitamin C (Integrative Therapeutics Buffered Vitamin C)
- Curcumin (turmeric) (Xymogen Curcuplex-95)
Plan #2 Full Immunity
For $299 per month, you receive everything in Plan #1 plus supplements chosen for their immune enhancement. Also two IV therapies per month.
- Multiple vitamin blend (Integrative Therapeutics Multiplex without Iron)
- Omega-3 fatty acids (Metagenics Omegagenics EPA-DHA 1000)
- Vitamin D (Xymogen K2-D3 5000)
- Vitamin C (Integrative Therapeutics Buffered Vitamin C)
- Curcumin (turmeric) (Xymogen Curcuplex-95)
- Immune Mushroom blend (Fufluns Fungi Rejuvenator Capsules)
- High potency Probiotic blend (Metagenics UltraFlora Balance)
For the two IV therapies, choose from:
- Immune Boost
- Metabolism Boost (weight control)
- Myer’s Cocktail
- Ozone
- Phosphatidyl choline
- Glutathione
Plan #3 The Complete Restore
Our most comprehensive plan, for those who want to use supplements and IV therapies for optimal wellness and peak health. It’s pretty impressive, if I do say so myself. For $499 per month, you receive a month’s supply of:
- High potency multiple vitamin (Integrative Therapeutics Multiplex without Iron)
- Omega-3 fatty acids (Metagenics Omegagenics EPA-DHA 1000)
- Vitamin D (Xymogen K2-D3 5000)
- Vitamin C (Integrative Therapeutics Buffered Vitamin C)
- Curcumin (turmeric) (Xymogen Curcuplex-95)
- Immune mushroom blend (Fufluns Fungi Rejuvenator Capsules)
- Probiotic (Metagenics UltraFlora Balance)
- Brain and energy enhance blend (Xymogen ATP Ignite Powder)
- Detoxification blend (Integrative Therapeutics Detox Factors)
Plus any four IVs, choosing from:
- Immune Boost
- Metabolism Boost (weight control)
- Myer’s Cocktail
- Ozone
- Phosphatidyl choline
- Glutathione
You can also create a plan tailored to your specific needs. You may choose to emphasize anti-aging (adding UBQH, or UltraResveratrol) or to focus on cognitive/memory health (adding NeuroFlam).
You may even want to tackle my own regimen of 18 supplements twice daily, which, I might add, can get expensive. But heck, I’m worth it.
WholeHealth Plans will launch on Monday, June 7. Watch for an email with an invitation to sign up or click here for more information on WholeHealth plans.
Be well,
David Edelberg, MD