What is Clinical Nutrition?

Clinical Nutrition uses laboratory analysis, your medical history and personal lifestyle to formulate an individual protocol to meet and exceed your wellness goals.

Clinical nutrition centers on blood chemistry and laboratory analysis to screen and identify imbalances in body metabolism. Thus forming a foundation by which we make sound recommendations, screen for other underlying health concerns and creating a baseline in order to monitor for changes in treatment.

All first time patients will have an initial in-depth intake appointment, a full blood panel analyzed and an individualized protocol will be created based on the findings. The goal is a maintenance plan after the clearance of initial concerns. Patients are then placed on a general check-up schedule and monitored for optimal health and disease prevention.

The Institute’s nutritionist, Debra K.S. Delson, provides this step-by-step protocol and guidance to living a healthier lifestyle. She intends her practices to be incorporated with ease and eventually become second nature. She works to move people away from quick fix diet fads and random supplementation. These practices, which do not address lifestyle changes and clinical diagnosis, ultimately fail in the end.
Whether treating a current disease or preventing one; optimizing your health through realistic meal plans, supplementation, blood chemistry analysis and laboratory testing, clinical nutrition stands to benefit everyone.

History

The study of nutrition dates back to the 18th century, when the French chemist Lavoisier discovered a relationship between our metabolism of food and the process of breathing. By the early 20th century, scientists had found that diseases — such as beri beri, rickets, scurvy, and pellagra — were associated with certain diets. By 1912, the Polish chemist Casimir Funk had found a substance (vitamin B1) that actually prevented beri beri, and he named it “vitamine.” Later it was found that these diseases were caused by the lack of specific nutrients — vitamin B1 (thiamine), vitamin D, vitamin C, and vitamin B3 (niacin) respectively.

In the early 1940s, the National Research Council set Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs). Researchers and scientists continue to find out more about how individual nutrients can help prevent and treat disease. But they are also learning how whole foods may allow nutrients to work together. For example, antioxidants like beta carotene, selenium, vitamin E, and vitamin C, when consumed in foods, appear to protect against the development of heart disease, cancer, and other chronic degenerative diseases.

The old RDAs have been replaced by Dietary Reference Intakes (DRIs), which show how much of a nutrient we need every day to maximize health and lower the risk of chronic disease (in contrast to RDAs, which listed the minimum amount needed to prevent a deficiency).

Today, Clinical Nutrition increasingly incorporated into mainstream medical treatment for its powerful effect on disease prevention and optimizing individual’s health.