Six years ago, I started putting together content and the idea for a mentorship.
But not just any mentorship – I wanted a community that I didn’t have when I started my career in functional medicine.
I have had training from over 16 organizations and practiced exclusively as a Functional Medicine PA-C for 12 years in various practices. I have worked with patients in the following settings:
- High cost and concierge-like practice
- Moderate cost and membership-based practices
- Fee-for-service
- Owned a practice (where I focused on low-cost services)
- Insurance-based care
However, there were limitations in my training.
Very little of my training addressed the “practical” implementation of functional medicine that could help with patient follow through, providing functional medicine care more affordably or efficiently, or the art of educating patients to improve patient empowerment.
I joined a few mentorships, and was able to get some clarifications by utilizing Facebook forums, but then they didn’t provide exactly what I was needing in real-life practice. So I came up with an idea….
Create a community that is similar to Facebook interface but more organized and less “Wild West” (e.g. many who comment on posts tend to give a list of treatments to use, but it looks like a regurgitation of training vs real-world experience)
And I wanted the community to be comprised of like-minded licensed clinicians who:
- Want to provide “practical” and methodical, yet effective functional medicine care
- Are trying to avoid “green allopathy“
- Want more evidence-informed medicine (and maybe even a database that is similar to UpToDate)
- Know they have a supportive community to lean on
What do I mean by “practical”?
To me, this means using an effective approach that takes into consideration real-world clinical settings and patient needs/preferences. Although my training was invaluable, there was limited education on how to address the following key factors which impact functional medicine care:
- Time Constraints: Most practitioners don’t have the time to spend an hour or more on gathering and organizing patient history, or reviewing comprehensive labs, let alone type out a treatment plan based on this information.
- Patient Nuances: Patients aren’t often given options and expectations in their care. All the training programs I have gone through included case examples, but they mostly showed the initial presentation and the outcomes. They didn’t discuss the “in between” (e.g. trial-and-error treatments, factors that influenced successes, what the patient – or practitioner – felt was most helpful).
Why do I call this a “Collective” Mentorship?
- Collective = done by people acting as a group
- This is a place to learn from each other, co-work together, and co-create a community that is focused on staying curious and practical in the practice of functional medicine
So that’s the brief background of where this mentorship came from. Now, thousands of hours and dollars later, it’s officially ready!
What is included:
- Live Q&A sessions (Mentor Sessions)
- Weekly tips (Wisdom Wednesdays)
- Focused Mastery Workshops to review specific topics in 15-20 minutes
- Networking and Co-Working events
- Ability to submit cases and labs for group review and support
- Case review (involving a review of 3 potential treatment approaches)
- Group development of a “knowledge database” (i.e. collection of high quality scientific articles – aka reviews and meta analyses – to support clinical application of functional medicine…like an UpToDate for functional medicine!).
What is not included?
- Comprehensive education in functional medicine (there are many many options for this!)
- Protocols (implies one-size-fits all)
- Promoting or selling products
A brief breakdown of what to expect
Weekly:
- Wisdom Wednesdays: Tips on the art of practicing Functional Medicine, including but not limited to nuances in working with patients, efficient use of EMRs, and ways to document patient discussions that may have legal ramifications.
Monthly:
- Monthly Focused Mastery Workshops (FMWs) to increase comprehensive understanding of a subject (e.g. reviewing individual functional medicine testing markers such as secretory IgA, pros and cons of a suppressed TSH)
A few times a month:
- Virtual Co-Working events (with ability to create your own)
- Two Mentor Sessions (Q&A) a Month (tentatively scheduled for Wednesdays). This will be a time to discuss pre-submitted cases, bring up concerns or challenges you are having in practice, or just a time to interact with fellow members.
Ongoing:
- Forums for ongoing discussion of patient cases, scientific literature, and more.
- Various posts by the founder outlining case reviews, specific treatments or testing, and questions to consider in practice.
And in case discussions, we will focus on 3 potential approaches. For example, when addressing a patient who has GI symptoms:
- Methodical Approach, provided in Phases or Steps for Treatment: Provide a list of steps to implement over a few months (steps that may include supplements, or may start with dietary and digestion optimization)
- Blanket Testing/Treatment Approach: Consider how a stool test may alter a treatment approach (especially if ordering this at an initial visit), and/or pros and cons of running a stool test and SIBO breath test, and treating multiple findings in one visit
- Minimal Approach (e.g. if working in an insurance-based practice and only have the ability to address 1-2 things affecting health in 5 minutes, or working with a patient who is easily overwhelmed): E.g. addressing digestion and providing a list of foods to help gut motility (and using EMR templates to assist with this).
Cost = $99 a month
Prerequisites:
- Active medical or nursing license verified via NPI database (MD, DO, PA, NP, APRN, RN, CNM or similar; other licensed professionals with an NPI will be considered)
- Completed at least one introductory course (or currently enrolled in a training program) on functional medicine, to be aware of the differences in functional medicine vs mainstream medicine approach to chronic health issues. For example (many of which provide category 1 CME):
- Institute for Functional Medicine (IFM) AFMCP course or free Introduction to Functional Medicine
- Enrolled in School of Applied Functional Medicine (SAFM)
- Enrolled in, or completed, Functional Medicine University (FMU)
- Kharrazian Institute’s free Essentials of Functional Medicine Course (30-day access)
Are you a good fit? This is for:
- Clinicians who prefer a more structured aka methodical approach to implementing functional medicine care (vs a broad, “test and treat everything” approach)
- Clinicians who believe we need to consider the costs of testing and treatments in order to improve patient outcomes and decrease clinician overwhelm
- Clinicians who want to think beyond “green allopathy” (e.g. trying to avoid “what supplement do I use for [symptom/condition]”)
- Clinicians who want to provide more “evidence-informed” care
- Clinicians who utilize critical thinking (e.g. staying curious/questioning about what we learn in functional medicine training as it is applied to real-life clinical situations)