Combining Conventional and Natural Therapies for Optimum Health and Wellness
Dear Patient,
Let’s talk about supplements and other natural therapies. It’s part of our job to HELP you to get natural therapies in a SAFE, EVIDENCE BASED, and COST EFFECTIVE way.
It is imperative that you order your supplements through Associates of Integrative Medicine, P.C.
Here are the reasons why:
It's CHEAPER:
We order your supplements from one of two nationwide pharmaceutical grade distributors. Because Dr. Roy is a doctor, the pharmaceutical grade supplement companies give us these natural therapies WHOLESALE.
In an effort to keep your COST DOWN, we order your supplements using Dr. Roy’s provider number and YOUR shipping address, so the distributor drop ships directly to you.
The cost to you is:
- LESS than retail, which charges a 50% markup
- LESS than Amazon and other discount superstores - which charge a 15-45% markup
- SIGNIFICANTLY LESS than pharmacies like Beaumont which charge 100% markup
IT’S SAFER.
The Federal Government does NOT well regulate supplements. What this means is that there are problems with the source, purity, quality, and dose.
There are a few highly reputable companies that make pharmaceutical grade supplements. As part of her doctorate, Dr. Roy has spent significant time with these companies understanding their process.
Amazon and other internet superstores offer these high quality supplements but the government just released a letter to the healthcare industry letting us know that 60% of the supplements on Amazon are fraudulent. Large companies are buying the labels and bottles from the reputable brands: Pure Encaps; Metagenics; Thorne; and filling the bottles with placebo or contaminated product.
These are not the only issues with safety.
Supplements that have good evidence that they are cancer fighters or anti-aging, like Curcumin, are highly contaminated. There is a solvent, a 1-2 dichlorethane, that is remaining on the herb when it’s processed that causes cancer. The government has issued 28 warning letters to the supplement companies asking them to pull it from the shelves, but they haven’t because it’s highly profitable. There are only two safe sources of Curcumin, both of which we use.
Part of the benefit of seeing Dr. Roy is that she continually abreast of the risk to you and is able to help you navigate through those choices, and choose only the safest source of supplements.
It’s INDIVIDUALIZED:
Not everything natural is for everyone. For example, if you were a smoker, high dose antioxidants in supplement form, like beta carotene INCREASE your risk of lung cancer. Another example is that high dose Vitamin E, is a single tocopherol form will increase the risk of high grade prostate cancer, if a person is to get prostate cancer.
When we design a plan for you, it’s specific to you, it’s tailored to your individual concerns, and you can rest assure that it will meet your health goals.
It’s EVIDENCE BASED:
This means that what we order for you has CLINICAL EVIDENCE that it WORKS. There are three different levels of evidence.
Anedoctoal means people have tried it and said it works for them. This is great, but not sufficient for us.
Pre Clinical means it has been tested in trial on animals or in a cell study. This is very suggestive, but still not good enough for our patients. We only recommend supplements and natural therapy that have CLINICAL evidence. This means they have been shown in trial with human beings to be effective.
This means you are not spending your hard earned money on supplements that unethical companies spend a ton of money marketing…rather you are getting the right natural therapies for YOU.
We hope to make care affordable for everyone, and we do our best to make it possible for natural therapies to also be affordable, in a climate where it can be an uphill battle. Please DO NOT order your supplements from anyone other than Associates of Integrative Medicine, P.C. and allow Pam to set it up, so that it’s automatic every two months.
This means you will get individualized, high quality, pharmaceutical grade supplements that are safe and evidence based, delivered DIRECTLY to your homeboy the pharmaceutical distributor at close to WHOLESALE.
Talk to Dr. Roy directly if you have further questions and CHECK OUT our Facebook page and your email for regular posts that educate you further on supplements.
