Government research indicates that every day an estimated nine million Australians take prescription medicine, two million take over-the-counter medication and seven million take complementary medicine.

Additionally, almost a quarter of a million people are hospitalised each year due to problems caused by their medication.

The evidence seems to be mounting up that western medicine doesn’t always hit the mark.

Take this scenario, for example. A person has some pain in their knee. They see their GP, who refers them to a physio, but the pain continues. So the patient heads back to the GP who then refers them to a surgeon. The surgeon does what surgeons do and operates. The patient is then left with months of post- surgery recovery and more prescription medications to help with post-surgical pain.

This seems to be the status quo in specialists’ rooms across the country. So if mainstream medicine isn’t going to the root problem, what are the options?

Seeking out an open-minded, educated health practitioner who understands the ‘whole of body’ approach to health is the first step. And the key to finding these people is to ask the right questions. These include:

• When you do your assessment, do you take into consideration the impact of the lymphatic endocrine and nervous systems.
• When I have a health issue, do you look at where the pain is presenting or my whole body.
• And do you believe invisible inflammation can be recognised in the human body? (The answer here is yes and can display as fatigue, stiffness, headache, loss of appetite, pain, oedema, swelling, redness, memory problems and loss of function.)