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Choosing a Holistic Healthcare Provider Just got Easier

Jan 28, 2013 ● By Megy Karydes

Choosing a physician to guide us through more than just isolated emergencies or checkups is not always easy. We want a doctor that will discuss our medical history, diet and lifestyle, and how they all work together, and then create an individualized treatment plan. They should be well versed in natural modalities, including manual therapy and acupuncture. For women, expertise in issues such as cervical dysplasia and reproductive health is a must, and the ability to perform breast thermography diagnostics, rather than a radiation-laden mammogram, is a plus.
 

Dr. Nicholas LeRoy, a local chiropractic physician, considers himself a holistic medicine specialist, and often treats patients using alternative and holistic therapies at his Chicago-based Illinois Center for Progressive Health. LeRoy states that he often begins a relationship with his patients by discussing diet and nutrition. “The most intimate and significant relationship we have with our environment is our diet,” he explains. “I don’t believe a doctor can claim to be a holistic medicine expert if he or she doesn’t spend a great deal of time discussing this cornerstone of health.”

As a chiropractic physician, LeRoy feels he is in a unique position to treat patients because of his thorough understanding of how the body works, along with an array of natural modalities, including manual therapy, acupuncture and diet and nutrition counseling. “This detailed understanding of human physiology, neurology and endocrinology allows me to pick and choose appropriate diagnostic tests to skillfully assess the reasons why a person is not well.

I can then design an individualized treatment plan that is comprehensive, utilizing dietary, nutritional and lifestyle modifications, as well as therapeutic interventions with chiropractic, acupuncture and massage. In contrast, most medical doctors [M.D.] have the training to perform diagnostic tests; however, the therapy they recommend is restricted largely to prescription medications.”

While LeRoy sees adults and children at his practice, his focus is on women’s health. In the mid-1990s, he began researching alternative therapies for gynecologic disorders out of a necessity to help his female patients. “In 1995, I had a patient with cervical dysplasia,” he says. “I had come across a naturopathic treatment for this condition that uses a topical solution to slowly kill the precancerous cells. She did not want to surgically remove part of her cervix, so we did this treatment and her dysplasia cleared up.”

Breast thermography has been promoted as a pain-free and radiation-free alternative to mammography, and LeRoy was one of the first physicians in the Chicago area to use it starting in 1995. He performed the test on a patient that was too young for a mammogram with a suspicious lump, noting, “Breast thermography was the most reasonable alternative.”

One of the reasons LeRoy favors breast thermography is that because it doesn’t use harmful radiation, it can be performed on women in their early 20s to obtain a baseline. “This baseline is like a fingerprint, in that the vascular pattern should never change, so screening can be performed yearly, always looking back to the baseline to observe changes that are associated with cancer. Because mammography increases breast cancer risk, it shouldn’t be used before the age of 50.”

LeRoy cites a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine that found that screening mammography leads to over-diagnosis. “Over-diagnosis refers to the identification of cancers that, in time, would have cleared up without treatment,” he explains. “In contrast, thermography is very good at identifying highly aggressive cancers that tend to have a lot of vascular abnormalities.”

LeRoy also provides weight-loss counseling, pain management and gastrointestinal therapies, as well as primary care services. According to LeRoy, he also is one of the few chiropractors in Illinois credentialed by BCBS HMO as a primary care physician.

The doctor does not approach his patients’ needs with a cookie-cutter approach. “I spend as much time as is necessary to complete the detective work that will allow me to design an individual approach to whatever are the patient’s concerns,” he says, often performing all of the diagnostics and therapies himself, including drawing blood, so his patients won’t get lost in the shuffle of seeing various technicians.

 

Nicholas LeRoy is a holistic chiropractic physician at the Illinois Center for Progressive Health, located at 1002 W. Lake St., in Chicago. For more information, call 312-243-3338 or visit DrNick.net.