Time constraints are a sad reality in today’s healthcare system.  Doctors aren’t free to practice the art of medicine (as they might like to) because they must see dozens of patients per day.  As a result, patients feel like no one is listening and struggle to get answers.

When you begin your program with Scala Precision Health, we ask for your top 3 issues.  This is a starting point to narrow down which labs to run and to address your most important health questions first.

Why is this important?  Maybe you feel tired all the time.  Many people feel fatigue and it can be for many reasons.  We drill down on your specific case:  Can you pinpoint the onset of your fatigue?  What are your physical, mental and emotional stresses?

Asking questions and listening helps us meet you where you are and help you solve your health puzzles.

Our programs begin with various diagnostic assessments:

• Digestive tract
• Nervous system
• Cardiovascular system
• Genetic factors
• Brain chemistry
• Toxicity levels

If you have recent blood tests, we begin with those and order more services as needed.  Remember, we are working in conjunction with your doctor or one of the doctors who work with Scala Precision Health.

Depending on your major complaints, it’s likely you will need one or more tests that fall outside the standard protocol.  Hormone panels that report your cortisol levels, male and female sex hormones, and DHEA often reveal the deeper, underlying causes of fatigue, muscle loss, fat gain, lagging libido, brain fog, and performance issues.

Many symptoms attributed to “old age” are simply correctable hormone imbalances.

The advanced metabolic testing services we offer is followed, when needed, with advanced imaging to detect abnormalities in structure and function.  Imaging can include MRIs for brain scans, blood flow and ligament and tendon damage.  The IDEXA, the “intelligent” DEXA scan, measures body fat to muscle ratios in the whole body.  This imaging is useful before a weight loss program or for conditions that cause muscle wasting (i.e., cancer, endurance sports, and aging).

There are two major flaws associated with the interpretation of lab work.  The first has to do with accepted “normal” ranges.  The ranges that you see next to your results on your lab work are determined by the average results of a population of sick people.  Can you see why this would not be an accurate assessment of “normal” for your body?  On top of that, every body is biochemically unique.  What’s normal for you might not be normal for someone else, depending on your unique makeup.

Secondly, traditional blood work analysis often reveals a disease only when it’s well under way, when the readings cannot be ignored and the body is experiencing severe symptoms.   Clinicians trained in functional interpretation of lab work know what to look for before disease appears AND order more tests to confirm the cause of an imbalance in your results.

Uncovering thyroid disease is a prime example of the limitations of conventional lab work interpretation.  When you go to your doctor for a blood panel, usually TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) alone will be ordered.  A true picture of thyroid health should include TSH levels, but also T3, reverse T3, T4, free T4, and others.  Generally, a high TSH will induce a practitioner to order more tests, but the prescription is usually the same:  levothyroxine (a synthetic form of T4).  A majority of patients find this solution inadequate over the long-term.

The reason patients do not find relief from thyroid disease is that the thyroid does not work alone; yet, in-depth testing is almost never ordered.  At Scala Precision Health, the proper tests are run and interpreted using the latest information and research.

Types of testing you may need:

• Intestinal tract (gut flora)
• Hormonal
• Nutritional
• Brain chemistry (neurotransmitters)
• Genetic (drug interactions and metabolization)

You’re already familiar with the practice of treating symptoms in isolation. Everything in your body is connected; therefore, health issues are interrelated.  This is why treating lab results doesn’t work.

For example, contrary to common belief, heart disease is not caused by high cholesterol.  Heart disease is caused by inflammation.  High cholesterol is just a symptom as it’s the body’s way of repairing damage inflicted by inflammation.  The conventional reaction is to prescribe statin drugs to lower cholesterol levels.  You can see here that treating the symptom does not address the inflammation that caused the high cholesterol.  However, statins also lower CoQ10 levels, a powerful nutrient that is especially crucial to heart health!

So you see that treating lab results causes unwanted side effects and ignores the true cause.  And includes the game of taking one medication to overcome the side effects of another.

In contrast to conventional methods, our services test multiple metabolic markers that reveal information on the cellular level.  If one of the “dominoes” isn’t falling properly, we can detect subtle evidence of dysfunction and take preventative action earlier.

As your health detective, Scala Precision Health takes many factors into consideration before recommending your personal protocol:

• Environmental
• Nutritional
• Medications / Supplements
• Diet & Lifestyle

This multi-factorial approach is a journey, not a quick fix, but can achieve lasting results.

Everybody and every body is biochemically unique. That is one of the guiding principles of Scala Precision Health. The diet and exercise program that works for your genetics might not work for your neighbor’s.

One woman might be gaining weight from a condition called estrogen dominance, while another might be eating too little fat (yes, this does happen). Weight loss is multi-factorial. There are also differences between men and women. So the weight loss program that worked for your best friend or spouse may not work for your body in the long term. Personalized fat loss while preserving muscle mass replaces the calories in/calories burned myth.

All our services are personalized; however, general programs are available for:

• Men’s Hormone Balancing
• Women’s Hormone Balancing
• Medically-Supervised Weight Loss
• Cardiovascular Treatment
• Athletic Training and Performance
• Brain Injury/Concussion
• Pre-hab prior to and Rehab after Surgical Procedures
• Prenatal Nutrition (for both Moms- and Dads-to-be)

And then you have complex, multi-factorial mysteries. These cases most clearly demonstrate the advantages of our brand of personalized care. Most clients in this category have, unfortunately, been looking for answers for a long time. That’s because modern medicine doesn’t have a tidy explanation for how they’re feeling.

Are your lab tests all coming back “normal”, but you still feel horrible? Have you been to a few medical specialists—even psychologists—but continue to search because you know there’s something they’re all missing?

Do you stand in the vitamin aisle of your health food store and wonder which to take? Are you tempted to pick up the latest miracle supplement suggested by Dr. Oz on TV? There’s nothing inherently wrong with the products on store shelves, but whether they are something your body needs is another question.

If every body is biochemically unique, then it only makes sense to customize the protocol and the chemistry used to treat each body. We work with several compounding pharmacies to tailor needed supplements to the specifications determined by the doctor who works with you. The supplements can also be administered through different delivery systems: transdermal, subcutaneous, sublingual, inter-muscular injection and intravenous.

For example, athletes perpetually search for performance supplements that can give them an edge. But no amount of supplement can help an athlete whose intestinal tract is not absorbing nutrients in the first place. Testing may indicate intestinal tract imbalances, such as Candidiasis (or yeast overgrowth), which can harm the function of the gut and impede nutrient absorption.

A change in diet and certain medications can eliminate the yeast overgrowth. Meanwhile, nutritional formulations can be administered that bypass the ailing intestinal tract. Once the gut is healed of the yeast overgrowth, it can be reinocculated with beneficial flora (probiotics). Testing can also determine the most beneficial types of probiotics, thus ending the conundrum of choice we described earlier.

An athlete’s training regimen may need to be adjusted until the body is nutritionally sound. When the athlete goes back to normal training, the body will have more power, strength and endurance on a cellular level that no performance supplement can provide. Nothing replaces a healthy gut!

Some clients reach us at their 11th hour. They’re tired of waiting for answers and often cannot wait two weeks for another office visit after they begin their protocol.

Specific customized treatment services need specific kinds of intervention. Clients coming off of very powerful antidepressants, which are highly addictive drugs, are a prime example. Antidepressants carry black box warnings, which means they can cause death. The first 72 hours are especially critical.

Antidepressants damage the pre-frontal cortex of the brain and damage multiple metabolic systems of the body; they increase insulin, increase fat storage and cause imbalances in the intestinal tract. With these side effects in mind, diet, hormone levels, activity and sleep must be adjusted in order to keep the body resonating. Our team services you and can adjust protocols based on how clients respond.

Pre-hab and rehab also rely heavily on timing. Whether pre/post natal, brain injury, hip replacement, chemotherapy, or cardiac surgery, these are areas where adjustment is critical. The person whose multiple body systems are balanced and more nutritionally fit will recover faster and/or leave the hospital faster.