THE CURIOUS MINDS CLUB 
Paediatricians repeat this adage often. It acts as an important reminder about adjusting dose for children's reduced weights. But that's only the start of, what is, an almost entirely different solar system we need to immerse ourselves in. Diagnosis is different too. ...
In yet another timely reminder that information alone does not produce behaviour change - Exhibit A - myself. The unspoken beauty of living in the Byron shire is that when any festivals come to town so too does the flu & to the entire community, whether you...
I will never forget a conversation I had with a GP colleague many years ago now, he looked tired and we were chatting about workloads etc. and he said to me, “If I had have known in uni what I know now about general practice I would have specialised!” He then went on...
We had a great case in one of our graduate mentoring sessions the other day (thanks Kate 😉 ) , about a 40 something mum of 3 who reported to have cyclical mood and depression. Further investigation of the case, however, revealed that some of the key characteristics...
So...a 55 year old female walks into your clinic only recently diagnosed with Graves disease but when you look through her old blood work it looks like actually she has had hyperthyroidism (or at the very least suppressed TSH) for some time prior. She is experiencing...
I had one of those conversations with a friend recently in which he was wondering out loud about what the point of it all is. Now don't panic...this is not 'suicidal ideation over a cuppa' kind of stuff ... no this is the regular existential crises that many of us...
I’ve just completed a seminar series educating practitioners across Australia about how to recognise & correct sex hormone dysregulation in men & the response has been overwhelming. Everyone seems to be in agreement that this subject was seriously...
So…a 40 something female walks into your clinic with depression & anxiety…sounds common enough right? But here’s the twist: she’s already seen another practitioner who ran a range of investigations revealing she has pyrroles, high copper levels & is...
I'm only human & there are some questions that do make me silently groan & invisibly (I hope!) roll my eyes. One is the old chestnut: “but the Japanese consume on average 7mg of iodine a day!” which is typically offered up as a rationale for the need...
Last week I spoke to a group of psychiatrists, doctors and nurses working at a psychiatric hospital about N-acetyl cysteine for a whole hour! Anyone who has worked in pharmaceuticals, (which of course I did in a previous life) or has seen medical CPD up close even,...
I was chatting with a colleague today about a complicated & interesting case of hers, severe hypothyroidism coupled with overt hypercortisolemia (salivary cortisol up to 230!). This is a distance patient & she’s sharing care with a couple of other health...
Like all thyroid disease, post-partum thyroid conditions seem to be on the rise – and often they rewrite the rule book when it comes to thyroid pathology & its management. Therefore for many of us it can add an extra element of uncertainty about how to help...
Ever noticed that thing called RDW (red cell distribution width) reported in your patients’ haematology results? Given that this parameter is currently regarded as one of the most important & earliest markers of a wide range of serious diseases, you might start...
These days it seems like patients can almost be divided into two groups: those that have a tendency to iron overload and those that struggle most of their lives just to keep ferritin in the red…and what a struggle it can be. So many clients have spent years...
Last weekend I attended the Science of Nutrition in Medicine Conference in Melbourne https://nutritionmedicine.org.au/enews/2015-02-06-Program.html and for those of you that didn’t make it I can tell you, it wasn’t your regular CPE event. I’m not sure if the...
One of the most common questions I’m asked is whether I have a ‘set list’ of tests that I request for every patient. Of course there is no ‘one size fits all’ in health & each patient presents with their own novel combination of issues & investigative...
We should all be as skilled in investigating & treating male hormone imbalances as we are female ones, yet this is often not the case. A lack of confidence in this area, which seems to be an issue for many, in particular will compromise our ability to...
So often in mentoring I hear about patients practitioners have struggled to treat primarily because of irregular points of contact....you know the type, the client who is an Irregular Regular or Random Regular, booking in to see you just once or twice a year or just...
I regard myself as integrative which means working collaboratively with other health professionals to get the best outcomes for our shared patients, sometimes that means my patients are taking psychiatric medications & there have been instances where I have seen...
It seems like K2 is the supplement on everybody’s lips right now and for good reason. This is particularly true in Australia where we’re seeing a flurry of new K2 products on the market thanks to a relatively recent TGA approval for this particular form of the...
"Health issues are rarely one individual textbook condition like they were during my studies. The interaction of the body is complex, and Rachel has given me valuable insight into how to link various pathology markers & physical aspects together. Test...
I read an interesting news item in Medical Observer this week about the increasing number of patients either overtly or covertly recording medical appointments on their smart phones. Have some of your patients already asked if they could do this? Mine have and I’m...
You might have heard me talk about using an ‘upstream’ rather than ‘downstream’ approach in nutrition – the concept is very naturopathic… look at the water source and address things there rather than just tweak things downriver! One of the most important upstream...