Fibromyalgia Treatment

As I progressed through my formal professional education I was always asking questions. I wasn’t one to take everything taught to me at face value. I needed to UNDERSTAND the reasons and mechanisms behind what was presented. I was not a good student for the lazy professor that wanted to skate buy and spit out information … I questioned, challenged, pondered, and pointed out obvious discrepancies that most of my peers simply accepted as fact.

My goal in becoming a doctor was to understand what was really going on with a sick person’s physiology, and work WITH the body to restore better function. There is a huge difference between treating a set of symptoms and treating a PERSON. The second one requires understanding what is causing those symptoms and working on the faulty physiology.

Over the last 23 years I studied and applied the latest research in neurology, nutrition, and functional medicine to create a truly unique, intergrated, whole person approach to treating fibromyalgia and chronic pain that has literally given many of our fibromyalgia patients a second chance at living again.

Science has shown us in the last twenty years that the brain can change, re-mold, and create new connections, based on the stimulation you give it. It has been proven, over and over again, that it is possible to systematically diagnose specific areas of the brain that are weak, and change those weak areas through non-invasive rehabilitation. The scientific term for this is Brain Plasticity.

We began our work at our Lancaster Fibromyalgia Relief center by exclusively treating chronically ill patients with chronic pain and fatigue. By using my Brain-Based approach, I was helping people turn around their lives, giving them a chance to live well again, after countless doctors and specialists had given up.

It didn’t take me long to realize, and you may have come to this conclusion because of your own circumstance, that when a person has a health condition that is not considered life threatening, and there is no easy fix, our medical system is completely inadequate.

I would see the desperation on the faces and in the eyes of the patients I treated. They were yearning to have someone listen to them, to spend the time necessary to get to the bottom of their problem, and most importantly, to help them break the chains their illness had put on their lives.

I understood them, and I knew I had to engineer my practice and professional life to allow me to function as the doctor I needed to be for them. I couldn’t rush people in and out in 10 minutes like commonly happens in the HMO medical model. We had to take the time and work with each individual to get to the root of the problem.

I not only stepped outside the box, I LEAPED out of it. Inside that box was a system that never could help the people in the way they needed to be helped.

Although early on I got great results with my brain based approach, I realized something was missing. I would get amazing results with most, yet with others I couldn’t make the changes I needed. The most confusing part was the patients that did not have good results, seemed to have the same characteristics and neurological test findings as the ones that were successful.

“There had to be something missing…”

This led me on a journey to find what I was missing. Shortly thereafter, I made an important personal discovery. I realized I was trying to do what most other doctors do. I was looking at the human body as if it was compartmentalized. I was focused on brain and nervous system function, without looking at the hormone system, immune system, and gastrointestinal function. I knew I would have to understand and look at all these systems, at the same time, if I wanted greater and more consistent results.

So for a huge period of time, I hibernated at night and on the weekends. I poured through scientific journals, text books, and articles. I traveled across the country to learn from the best teachers I could find. I burned the midnight oil so to speak.

It was this intense study of physiology, neurology, and immunology that led to my greatest discovery…everything in the body effects everything else. The properl treatment and management of any chronically sick or ill patient necessitates looking at EVERYTHING, all at once.

I began actually looking at and measuring everything. I began running the necessary laboratory tests needed to take this big picture approach. As I started doing this on more and more patients, I found that most of the patients we had previously had the least success with had thyroid problems, immune problems, adrenal fatigue problems, food sensitivities, chemical sensitivities, etc. They had many things that were all contributing to their symptoms. Many of the worst fibromyalgia and fatigue patients had an autoimmune mechanism involved in their symptom presentation.

Since there was often an autoimmune mechanism, meaning the bodies immune system has gone haywire and began attacking various parts of the body like the thyroid gland, stomach lining, and even part of the brain and nervous system, we knew we had to focus on calming the immune system if we were to stand a chance at helping these patients. So I took everything I knew about neurology, functional endocrinology, functional blood chemistry analysis, science based nutrition, and functional immunology and began making huge changes in their lives.

“The immune system, and all the things that effect the immune system (remember everything, effects everything else), was a huge missing factor for our previously failed cases…”

For most fibromyalgia sufferer’s today, the immune system will NEVER be looked at, “dissected”, and measured. In fact those doctors that like to confine themselves to that tiny box we spoke of, they won’t even acknowledge that anything can be done. Plus nobody is going to look at the intricacies of brain function, and weave all of the pieces together to really provide the help and create the functional changes that are needed to feel good again.

“Listening to that advice will only sentence you to a lifetime of suffering…”

As you continue reading this report you are going to discover the secrets and clinical pearls we have found to help fibromyalgia patients, naturally, without side effects or completely suppressing the immune system, or filling your body with pain pills, depression pills, and anti-seizure drugs, and why we think our all-natural approach to treating fibromyalgia is the BEST approach available.

“So What Is Our Treatment Philosophy?…”

Treat the Person, Not Their Diagnosis!

We have two main questions we ask when treating a patient with fibromyalgia symptoms…

• What is the neurological and metabolic mechanisms?
• Why is this happening?

Now why would I say that, and ask those specific questions? Well, because a diagnosis is just a starting point, and on top of that thousands of people are wrongly diagnosed every day from everything from migraine headaches to allergies.

So we don’t want to get caught up in what you would call a “traditional” diagnosis because it’s pretty generic actually. It doesn’t really give you any information on what you’re going to do to treat it. So if a doctor says, “Okay you have fibromyalgia” … now what? There’s about 500 reasons why you can have those symptoms. It’s not the same for every person. It’s not like strep throat where you catch it, take an antibiotic for it and everything goes away. It’s different than that.

So what we want to do is be very specific… because saying you have “fibromyalgia” is generic. It doesn’t give us information about what we’re going to do to change it. To make it better. To get rid of it. So we won’t be focusing on slapping a label on you.

“Your Chance At Getting Back To Normal Depends On Your “Functional Diagnosis”…

What do I mean by functional diagnosis? Well we are going to look at the regions of the brain that may not be working right, look at the GI system, the adrenal blood sugar system, the immune system, and look at your hormones … to what IS and what ISN’T functioning. Rolling all of your symptoms into a big diagnosis that doesn’t mean anything specifically, at least not anything that is going to help you get better, is never going to cut it.

So our functional diagnosis may be that you have decreased function of the right cerebellum, or the person has a TH-1 dominant autoimmune process that is attacking the brain and nerves, or Stage 7 adrenal exhaustion that is throwing off blood sugar regulation, and making nerve cells unstable.

It is not important for you to understand what all of that means, but for us the functional diagnosis gives us very specific things to change, improve, and increase things functionally, that results in our patients getting back towards normal, when they had made no improvement or gotten worse with all of the other treatments.

“So What Is Happening Inside The Body Of A Fibromyalgia Patient? …”

Like I mentioned before there are functional imbalances in the brain, GI system, the hormone system, and the immune system. It is not one thing, and it is usually never exactly the same for every patient. This is why doctors get frustrated and just throw their hands in the air, write a prescription, and hope you don’t show up in their office again.

“But I Hurt In My Muscles, Isn’t Fibromyalgia Just A Muscle Problem? …”

This is one of the biggest fallacies in the fibromyalgia community. Sure the pain is perceived in the muscles but the problem is not “IN” the muscles themselves. In fact, if they took a biopsy of all of the trigger points, and they have done this, their is nothing physiologically different inside the muscle. The pain is actually from a hyper sensitization of the nervous system. Normal touch sensations are perceived by the brain as pain whereas in everybody else it is just felt or perceived as touch.

“The Newest Scientific Findings For Fibromyalgia Talk About Central Sensitization …”

One of the reasons that you hurt more than other people is that your brain and nervous system have become “sensitized.” Here’s what that means, let’s use a math example.

Normally, 1+1 = 2, right? But in the brain of someone suffering with fibromyalgia symptoms, 1+1 = 10. Your brain perceives pain more than it should. And for some people it’s so bad that 1+ 0 = 10. It takes almost no stimulation for them to feel pain.

So a great portion of our work is involved in measuring the function of the brain, which we can do very accurately through functional neurological testing, and strengthening the weakened areas of the brain through a variety of methods.

“So in a nutshell, you are guaranteed to fail with traditional medical treatment for fibromyalgia, because 90% of the time the primary mechanism is never discovered, investigated, and the treatment aim is NEVER to restore function…”

Think about all of the drugs and pills you are taking, or have taken in the past. I bet you will not find ANY OF THEM that were restoring function. In fact I guarantee it. They were trying to treat a symptom, putting a band-aid on a wound so to speak, but not dealing with the problem at hand, and undoubtedly creating downstream side effects.

“Why Didn’t Any Of The Other Doctors Do This …”

If I had a dollar for every time I heard that from a patient, I would have a small fortune. The truth is we are going to look at you like nobody else ever has. We look at brain function, GI Function, Adrenal Function, Immune Function, and Hormone Function.

The truth is nobody is going to look at you the way we do. It’s the truth. No knock on your previous doctors but we take a different approach. THERE IS SOMETHING wrong with your body. You don’t deserve to get a diagnosis that simply means their is nothing else that can be done, or that you are sentenced to taking drugs that have side effects that are sometimes worse than the original problem. You deserve better … that is why we are so comprehensive.

“Let’s Talk A Little Bit About Your Brain and It’s Role In Your Symptoms …”

Your brain and nervous system need TWO things to survive and to thrive:

1. FUEL (In the form of oxygen and glucose)
2. ACTIVATION (more on this one in a minute).

Let me tell you how important fuel is to a fibromyalgia sufferer, especially blood sugar and oxygen…
Glucose comes from the foods you eat. Your brain and nerves must have enough glucose – but they do not like blood sugar swings or excessive blood sugar. Over-eating of sugar and high carbohydrate foods is epidemic. This causes major fuel problems for your brain as well as inflammation. You’ll also start to make too much cortisol.  Cortisol goes to your brain and it affects areas that are responsible for learning…so you get fibro-fog.  And I know all of you have experienced the symptoms we’re talking about.

This can cause glucose and insulin to become so high that it’s toxic to your nerves and actually destroy them. Sounds a little like diabetes doesn’t’t it?

“But All Of My Doctors Say My Labs Are “Normal” …”

Now, here’s the interesting part and what confuses many doctors… many people who are not diabetic still have this problem! They don’t use glucose correctly. They become resistant to insulin. Insulin and blood sugar levels become too high and damage nerves. EVEN though the lab tests may say that you are not full-blown diabetic, your body is behaving that way.

Another thing that will screw up your blood sugar levels is inflammation. Inflammation causes a part of your brain called the PVN to shut down your adrenal glands and keep you from having normal and regulated blood sugar. Chronic inflammation can not only cause blood sugar problems but also trigger an AUTOIMMUNE attack on your nerves.

“What About Oxygen, How Does That Affect My Brain?…”

After about age 20, YOU LOSE 1% EACH YEAR OF YOUR ABILITY TO USE OXYGEN! So, for example, at age 47 you’ve lost 27% of your capacity. Oxygen is like gasoline in the gas tank of your car. If you don’t have any gas in the car, you are not going anywhere. As you get older, having enough oxygen becomes crucial.

One focus of our recovery program is to increase your oxygen so your brain can do its job. This allows your brain, nerve cells, and ALL your body have adequate oxygen to work correctly… giving you have the best chance at recovering and feeling good again. We do that by improving your posture because poor posture will prevent you from breathing correctly and getting enough oxygen. We make sure your spine moves correctly because when you breathe, your entire spine moves. If part of your spine is stuck or restricted, you can’t breathe correctly or deeply enough. This robs you of fuel.

“I’m Anemic But My Doctor Says It’s No Big Deal…”

An extremely overlooked oxygen problem is anemia. Anemia means you ARE NOT going to get oxygen to your tissues. There are different kinds of anemia’s…iron, B12, Folic acid etc. And we can test for each one. Anemia is Very important to find and correct.

Without oxygen available for your brain and nervous system, most likely, no treatment will work! No supplement will work. No nutritional program will work.

So your brain needs fuel, which we just covered, and ACTIVATION.

“Can The Brain Really Change? If It Is Damaged Or Weakened Don’t I Just Have To Live With The Problem? …”

Think of your brain as a muscle. What happens if you never exercise or sit on your butt all day long? Do your muscles get strong? No. Of course not! Muscles need to be exercised and used to be healthy. Muscles need to be activated.

Your brain is the same way. The brain is a bunch of muscles. They all have different jobs. If they’re not activated and stimulated, they get weak. Part of the problem in fibromyalgia is that parts of your brain have become weak. They need to be stimulated so your WHOLE brain works the way its supposed to and you DON’T have the pain, tenderness, brain fog, memory problems and fatigue.

“Let’s Talk A Little Bit About Your Immune System…”

The immune system has two sides like a teeter-totter. The first side, called our “T”-Helper 1 System (TH-1 System), is our immediate immune system. It is responsible for an immediate attack against foreign invaders like bacteria or parasites. The cells involved in the TH-1 system are called macrophages, natural killer cells, and cytotoxic T Cells. It is our front line defense.

The other side of our immune teeter-totter is our T-Helper 2 (TH-2) system. It involves the production of antibodies to “tag” onto invaders so our TH-1 system can more easily destroy the invaders. It is our B cells that are responsible for producing the antibodies.

The balance between these two sides of the immune system are very important to look at with many fibromyalgia patients. For many patients we do special lab testing that lets us measure the function of your immune system, and systematically make natural changes that will help your body get rid of your fibromyalgia symptoms.

So How Did You Get Fibromyalgia? What Caused Your Body To Go Essentially Haywire? …”

Something that every fibromyalgia victim wants to know is “what caused this?” Well, “cause” is going to be hard to figure out. I mean it could be hundreds of different things, right? I think it’s better to use the word “trigger”— what triggered the fibromyalgia symptoms?

Many fibro sufferers can trace the start of their problems back to a major infection or major illness This could be pneumonia, or a bladder infection, or a yeast infection. For others it happened after a physical trauma like a car wreck.

Toxic exposure— you’re exposed to chemicals every day. Many fibromyalgia victims can’t get rid of these chemicals and toxic metals. The toxins build up and start to affect liver function, thyroid function, adrenal gland function — it’s like throwing a monkey wrench in the machine. The toxins have to be removed and the organ systems carefully rebuilt.

I’ve had several people whose symptoms started after being exposed to cleaning chemicals or fumes from new carpet and paint.

And emotional stress is just as strong of a trigger as anything else — going through a divorce, death of a loved one — stress revs up your inflammatory system and your adrenal glands. Chronic stress will totally throw your system out of balance.

Anyone of these things can start the fire burning…and a brain weakness, hormone problem, or a blood sugar problem can KEEP the fire burning and cause it to spread.

“So What Tests Might We Perform? …”

• Special Blood Chemistry
  • Finds anemia’s — remember when we talked about oxygen?
  • Find blood sugar problems
• Adrenal Stress Index
  • Looks at your adrenal glands and how well they are helping stabilize your blood sugar.
• Hormone Panel
  • Female and Male Hormones dramatically affect inflammation in the body and especially in the brain.
• Intestinal Permeability
  • This looks for a problem called Leaky Gut. A leaky gut is one of the ways that the immune system gets confused and triggers an autoimmune attack.
• Gluten Sensitivity & Gene Panel
  • This test is super important and checks to see number one, if your immune system is inflamed by gluten. Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley and rye. Many people have a GENETIC problem with gluten. And it’s like putting gasoline on a fire. The person eats gluten and their immune system fires up and attacks their nerve tissues. The worse kind of genetic problem with gluten is called celiac disease. This is a very important test for people with fibromyalgia.

Antibodies, just so you know, are what your immune system makes to help it find the things it wants to kill. So antibodies to your OWN nerve tissue is NOT a good thing. I have to determine if that’s happening in you, so we may have to order some antibody tests.

These next two tests are critical if there is a big immune or autoimmune component to your symptoms.

• TH1 TH2 Cytokine Panel
• Lymphocyte Subpopulation
  • These 2 tests let us mesasure the FUNCTION of the immune system. If your fibromyalgia is being caused by an autoimmune attack, these two tests are the key to getting the proper treatment.

“We look at fibromyalgia sufferer’s through a different set of ‘glasses’…”

Because of our understanding of functional immunology and functional endocrinology we take a very detailed look at a fibromyalgia sufferer. We run very elaborate immune panels that actually tell us what is wrong and what needs to be done to fix it.

We run laboratory panels to look at blood sugar disorders, hormone regulation, anemia patterns, and adrenal dysfunction. All of these things play a crucial role in your bodies normal function and we leave no stone unturned in determining exactly the source of your fibromyalgia problem.

Isn’t That A Lot of Tests?

That probably sounds like a lot of tests, doesn’t it? Well it is. And I know you may have already had a laundry list of tests, but I will guarantee you haven’t had these. Even if you had been lucky enough to get some of these tests done, the doctor who ordered them didn’t know how to interpret them, or what to do with the results. (No slam on your previous doctors. It’s just the awful truth of the state of health care).

Not everyone needs every test ran. We do one of the most thorough and extensive case reviews you have experienced. From your history, current presentation, and an initial consultation, we work with each individual to determine what is needed. It is truly an individualized approach.

“And it’s worth pointing out that, in reality, NO other doctor is going to do what I’m describing to you right now. They just simply won’t do it. Why?…”

One reason is they just don’t know that they need to. They’re seriously behind the times, living in 1940s, 50s and 60s. They are using a model that is outdated and doesn’t work for the majority of people. They’re not current on the latest scientific research (not “research” paid for by drug companies) and certainly don’t know how to use natural supplements and nutrition.

The second reason is – they and the insurance companies don’t consider this comprehensive approach and testing “medically necessary.” Do you know what the definition of “medically necessary“ really is?

What’s the minimum we can do and not get sued?

What a terrible joke! The system is broken and it’s no wonder people suffering with immune imbalances, autoimmune conditions, and chronic pain literally have NO chance in that system.

Because some of the tests we run are not considered medically necessary we have formed a lab CO-OP. We can use the “Costco Principle” to get a great rate on these tests. We are going to get the absolute best rate so you can get the tests you need to diagnose your problem. We have made it where virtually anyone can get the appropriate tests done.

Either way I work with patients to make it the easiest possible to get the tests that will help improve their condition. I have no interest in any lab company. Any money a patient of mine may pay for a particular lab is only the price the lab charges. My job in this area is to facilitate the gathering of the proper information to help us devise a specific plan of action that is going to help you shed your fibromyalgia pains and other related symptoms.

“If A Test Can Be Run Through Insurance We Will, But You Must Understand The Only Person Responsible For Your Health Is You …”

I hope that doesn’t rub you the wrong way. But the insurance company is not responsible for you to truly be healthy. In fact at best medicine may keep people alive a little longer these days, but certainly they are not in the business of improving the QUALITY of your life. That is your job ultimately, and something we will partner together to help facilitate for you.

I know you may not have experienced this before, but it is truly a partnership when you work with a doctor on your health condition. That is the way it was always intended, but unfortunately medicine and healthcare in general has moved away from that.

“We get results because we are thorough and look for the right things. We don’t cut corners. This is your health on the line…”

Believe me, after you’ve seen some truly desperate people suffering with fibromyalgia problems– AND you’ve seen, with your own eyes, and heard them tell you how much better they are; how much happier they are now…that they can go through a day without crying from the pain, fatigue, constant depression, insomnia and frustration—AND thank you for finally doing what needed to be done to find out how to help them…well then you understand how “medically necessary” this kind of approach really is. No matter what any insurance company, drug company, or out-of-touch doctor thinks to the contrary.

“Our First Step Is A Case Review, Consultation, and Initial Neurological Testing…”

Now the goal of the case review, consultation, and any initial testing is to tell us is what is functioning and what is not. Where has your physiology gone faulty. Then we can design a powerful, all-natural, step by step, approach including diet, lifestyle, and brain based rehabilitation to help you achieve your desired results.

We will most likely have many things we have to work on. We will systematically create a program that is going to change the abnormal physiological shifts we measured with our testing. Most times we have to normalize one dysfunction before we can effectively normalize the others.

“What If This Doesn’t Work For Me?…”

If you are sitting here reading this, you know that your present approach to helping your fibromyalgia problem is not helping adequately. Honestly I could teach my six year old son to give you the current treatment you are getting. “I’d tell him to run some labs, and if everything is “in range” give a fibromyalgia diagnosis and prescribe Lyrica and pain pills. Of course I am being sarcastic but that is exactly what I hear and see from patients every day.

You deserve better than this. You deserve to have a doctor who listens, who understands you, who is willing to do what it takes to help you, regardless of what some out of touch doctor or HMO thinks. Because it doesn’t matter what anybody else thinks, what matters is that your still suffering and you need someone that is going to treat you right and help you.

The number one factor that determines success and failure with a case, is how closely the patient follows my recommendations. If you do the things I prescribe, then you are going to go down the road you have been wanting, probably for a long time, which is…getting to “normal” again.

You are reading this because you are one of the smart few who wants to take control of your health, and does what it takes to help your body. Nothing else matters when you health goes south. I love working with patients like you because you are willing to sit here and learn about your problem, and listen, and make the changes necessary to get your health back on track. To get back to the business of living good again.

Call Us Today At (661) 940-6302