Every patient has a story.
And so does every naturopathic physician.
this is mine.
I knew as a 5-year old I wanted to be a doctor. Not that anyone else in my family was a doctor - it was just something that I knew I was called to do. That unexplained intuition was further solidified as watched a lot of my already small family get picked off by cancer all too young: pancreatic cancer, Hodgkin’s lymphoma, breast cancer, lung cancer … I saw my very fit and active Aunt Jan, 47 at the time she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, do the surgery, chemo and radiation. But she also did something the rest of our family members with a cancer diagnosis did not do: she changed her diet, lifestyle, began doing saunas and other forms of “alternative cancer treatment.” In those changes, I saw the health of her and her husband, who was also implementing these changes, drastically change. It was the first time I realized food is medicine. And it was her journey that inspired me to pursue a Nutritional Sciences degree paired with pre-medical coursework at Cornell University for my undergraduate, trying to merge the two worlds as food is medicine.
Fast forward 2 years, and I’m in my sophomore year hitting my head against a wall (also known as an organic chemistry textbook) wondering why I was doing this at all. I saw other pre-medical students rooting for their peers to fail exams to bring down the mean, sabotage lab samples and push themselves to the point of being unhealthy, both mentally and physically. So ironic, I thought, that this is how we are training future healthcare workers. In this existential period, a yoga teacher asked me about my strange degree combination. When I replied, “because I believe food is medicine, too,” she asked “Have you ever heard of naturopathic medicine or Bastyr University?” I had not, but that simple inquiry forever changed my life and its trajectory.
I took 5 years to figure out which path I wanted to take in health, wellness and medicine while working as an active travel guide for Backroads. In my time between leading trips in Italy, Vietnam, Cambodia, Alaska, Montana, Vermont (…), I always found myself either on a farm or shadowing a doctor. I grew up in Buffalo, NY, and on the East Coast especially, naturopathic medicine is not well understood, or even known about. I realized I would be losing the respect of those who did not understand what naturopathic medicine is - “hippy medicine,” at best - should I choose that route. But the more I shadowed in hospitals, the more I realized I did not want that life that seemed anything but healthy or to contribute to a system that seemed so broken for every person involved, doctors and patients alike. And the more I shadowed and talked to naturopathic physicians, I saw their ability to have greater than 15 minutes with patients and have discussion of not only treating disease, but finding root causes of illness. Hearing the patient’s story. Seeing the body as more than just a machine to be fixed. To me, that was the healthcare I wanted to practice. I graduated from a four-year accredited naturopathic medical school in Seattle, Bastyr University, and completed the conventional coursework of standard of care medicine to become a primary care physician with additional courses in multiple healing modalities to practice whole-person, integrated healthcare.
While not the exact path my 5-year old self would have envisioned, I still think she would be proud. I am so grateful to be practicing as a primary care physician in North Idaho and have a wide array of choices to discuss with my patients: botanical medicine, counseling, biofeedback, homeopathy, physical medicine, and yes, pharmaceuticals too.
Patients call me Dr. Casey. I’m a naturopathic medical doctor practicing as a primary care physician in North Idaho. I feel so fortunate to be practicing what I love and what I live.
Here are my essentials:
I believe in whole-person care - truly trying to tend to every aspect of my patients’ health in mind, body and soul.
I believe in putting nature back into naturopathic medicine, and that every human requires some way of connecting with the natural world around them.
I believe every person has a natural outlet of creativity to share with this world. Mine has always been writing. Sign up for email updates to follow lessons in medicine, food, wellness and life as I gratefully continue along this journey and share it with others through written word.
what is naturopathic medicine?
In truth, you will be hard-pressed to find two naturopathic doctors practicing identically. With the wide breadth of modalities and different personalities, this is both a benefit and drawback of the profession as each naturopathic physician has likely developed their own style, preferred modalities and specialties. While the profession is trained in conventional “standards of care,” we also have the opportunity to provide exceptional care that is individualized to patients needs.
For me, part of the original draw to becoming a Naturopathic Physician was the wide breadth of all of the modalities Naturopaths are trained in and can employ to help their patients. In addition to learning pharmacology and pathology, we also learn about botanical medicine, nutrition, counseling physical medicine, osteomanipulation, homeopathy (just to name a few) and how to help bring our patients to a state of wellness, not just absence of disease.
What I did not understand about Naturopathic Medicine before entering the profession is the philosophy and spirit of which all of the tools and modalities are built off of: the healing power and capacity of the human body. Though modalities and medicines are hugely valuable and useful in helping patients from the onset, the real goal of the Naturopathic Physician is to ask the question why. Our bodies are innate self-healers; break a bone and it will mend. Contract the flu and recover fully. If chronic pain, illness, disease exist, it is the task of the Naturopathic physician to ask why is the body behaving in this way and what is the cause of the imbalance. The answers to these questions are often multifaceted and require thinking about the patient from a viewpoint of totality: not just the physical body, but also the mental, emotional and spiritual.
Looking at patients in this lens of wholeness often takes a bit more time; time investment with the patients in office as well as time to see a meaningful, lasting result that answers that question of why. This is another reason I chose and love Naturopathic medicine: the opportunity to develop a relationship with my patients to truly get to know them and their unique disease in order to give them individualized, intentional care.
My Approach
I talk to my patients a lot about shared, informed decision-making for their healthcare. I believe for chronic conditions, which is the majority of my patient population, a discussion of my professional recommendation and also patient preferences is needed. While it is my first intuition and duty to address all foundations of health (sleep, connection, movement, nutrition, mental health…), sometimes my patient’s aren’t able to address them or are not ready to. My goal is to meet patients where they are at, listen to their story and walk the journey alongside them.
A huge part of my mission as a naturopathic physician is to encourage others to connect in nature in meaningful ways. Truly, I would love to put the nature back into naturopathic physician as much as possible. Just about every patient receives a “nature prescription,” and I encourage them to find a small (or big) way to connect with something of the natural world daily.
I also look at the body as more than just a “meat suit;” I truly believe in going deeper with patients who are ready in the realm of addressing root causes of chronic health issues which can often be related to more deeply seated causes outside of the physical aspect of the body. I often ask my patients to get curious about narratives they have about themselves as I dive into the psychology of emotion alongside them.
To understand more about tools that I use and conditions I treat, see my services page.
