Health Tips

Home / Health Tips

Functional Medicine 101 + Introducing Dr. Parisa Samsami

Functional Medicine (FM) is without a doubt the fastest growing medical specialty of the 21st century. Public interest and broad public acceptance of it continue to please me. Every day I hear the sentence, “I made this appointment because I wanted a functional approach.” When I ask patients how they learned about it, the answer is […]

IV Therapies, Part 1: The World Famous Myers’ Cocktail

Over the next few weeks I’ll be writing about the intravenous (IV) therapies we offer at WholeHealth Chicago–what they are, how they work, and who can benefit. There are IV protocols for the immune system, stress, macular degeneration, anti-aging, chronic infections like Lyme disease and chronic mono, toxic metals, and those used as adjunctive care […]

Michelle Obama: Thanks for Reminding Us We’re Not Alone

You probably read last week that Michelle Obama acknowledged she’d been experiencing what she described as low-grade depression. You may have wondered aloud, as I did, how anyone who sees what’s going on in the world could avoid it. Many of us are feeling hopeless or anxious, ruminating about where this is all going, eating […]

Covid-19 Worries

You may have noticed fewer Health Tips about Covid-19 recently, which might have struck you as odd given our dreadful numbers here in the US. Well, there was a reason for this. WholeHealth Chicago was one of hundreds of health-oriented websites that were sent cease-and-desist warning letters from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) alleging widespread […]

You Probably Don’t Need A Colonoscopy

Quite often the patient sitting before me helpfully finishes my sentence. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I need a colonoscopy.” This happens in person or during a Telemed visit when I remark how they’re approaching (or recently turned) 50, 60, or beyond. Or they’re a few years beyond 50 or 60, and I genially ask, “Your […]

WholeHealth Chicago IV Therapies: Metabolic Boost (Skinny Shots)

It’s really a bummer to add weight gain to the stressors you’ve been experiencing in this difficult year of Covid-19, police brutality, and economic crashes. You’re the victim of a perfect storm: inactivity, anxiety, disrupted sleep, and eating too many of the wrong calories. I know comfort foods are comforting, but did you really need […]

WholeHealth Chicago IV Therapies: Ultraviolet Blood Irradiation (UBI)

You should know that we follow the CDC safety guidelines and that all IV therapies are administered in a sanitized room by an appropriately attired staff member. You’ll be alone in the room during your 30- to 45-minute IV session, so bring something to read. I was as surprised as everyone else, including Anthony Fauci, […]

WholeHealth Chicago IV Therapies: Ozone

You should know that we follow the CDC safety guidelines and that all IV therapies are administered in a sanitized room by an appropriately attired staff member. You’ll be alone in the room during your 30- to 45-minute IV session, so bring something to read. It’s definitely worthwhile to have a basic understanding of ozone […]

Conquering Candida: A Telemedicine Consultation

You might be reading this Health Tip from a town 40 miles north of Mobile, Alabama, or somewhere west of Pecos, New Mexico, and you might be thinking, “Well, this sounds exactly like what I’ve got but there’s no doctor around here who knows anything about it.” We hear you. You’re a victim of the […]

Mold Toxicity: A Telemedicine Consultation

Most people who are ultimately diagnosed with chronic inflammation triggered by black mold have heard somewhere “mold can make you sick.” However, only a few make the connection between their years of ill health and the water damage in their basement or attic, behind their kitchen sink, in their car, or around the upstairs neighbor’s […]

Diagnosing and Treating “Sewer Breath” via Telemedicine

Those are actually the words patients use to describe their breath, though sometimes it’s “poop breath.” The medical term for bad breath, as you probably know, is halitosis, so if you don’t mind I’ll stick with that. For some people, the self-perception of chronic halitosis is more socially isolating that anything demanded by Covid-19. At […]

Functional Telemedicine, Wherever You Are

All things considered, we’ve rather enjoyed our telemedicine interactions with patients. Doctoring this way also recently provided me with an Aha! moment. What I realized was that much of what we do as Functional Medicine specialists, both diagnosis and treatment, can be done online with you never leaving your home. Such a consultation would include […]

Should You Get The New Antibody Test for Covid-19?

Before I answer that, let me give you a quick tutorial about your immune system and how it deals with any virus–Covid-19, measles, hepatitis, seasonal flu, even the common cold. The mechanics of your immunity, which has kept you alive all these years, is pretty much the same from virus to virus. If you read […]

Surviving Covid-19…and Beyond

You were coughing, exhausted, achy, and you had a headache. If you breathed in quickly, you coughed a lot. You thought you might be a little short of breath, but wondered if you were just anxious. You actually managed to find a place to get tested. Someone inserted a cotton swab so deeply up your […]

Immune Superstar: Mushroom Blends

To support your immune system, it may be helpful to take one capsule of a good mushroom blend twice daily and eat actual mushrooms frequently, incorporating them into the many meals you’re now cooking at home. According to Paul Stamets, who knows more about fungi than anyone, there are an estimated one to two million […]

Remote House Calls: Healing Touch and Shamanic Healing

In these days of distancing, more clients are connecting with me via phone or Skype for remote sessions. Even before the pandemic, some clients who had the option of seeing me in person opted for remote sessions. They’ve reported that it’s beneficial to be able to connect with me from the comfort of their own […]

Immune Superstar: Vitamin C

Exactly 50 years ago, in 1970, Linus Pauling, Nobel Prize winner in chemistry, published Vitamin C and the Common Cold. His research concluded that by taking large amounts of vitamin C (10 to 20 times the Recommended Daily Allowance/RDA) you would not only overcome any deficiencies but could boost your immune system enough to ward off […]

Taking Care of Yourself while Staying Home

Seeing Your Chiropractic Physician via Telemedicine? Absolutely! I know what you’re thinking. ‘How can you possibly give me an adjustment during a video conference?’  The short answer is I can’t, but when coming to our office for an in-person appointment is difficult or impossible, I can continue to help. As a chiropractic physician, I’ve been […]

Breakthroughs in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

To me, the greatest advance for the estimated 2.5 million adults, adolescents, and children with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) has been the slow but steady acceptance of its very existence by the conventional medical community. This has been a real uphill battle and we’re encouraged to finally see some (guarded) victories. The first description of […]

Issues with Endocrinologists: Thyroid Approaches and Big Pharma

My beefs with endocrinologists pretty much center on how they manage thyroid gland concerns, though they rarely win prizes for managing adrenal issues either. I don’t know any endocrinologists personally and rarely refer my patients to them. Occasionally, a patient with newly diagnosed hypothyroidism (low thyroid) will want to confirm the diagnosis with an endocrinologist. […]