Are health coaches the future of healthcare?

We all recognize that American healthcare is a badly broken system. Wildly overpriced, exploitative, with a focus on pharmaceuticals and medical procedures to the exclusion of basic issues such as nutrition, the role of nutrients, and the microbiome. Can we expect doctors, healthcare executives, pharma or medical device executives to find better solutions? 

I highly doubt it. One of the problems plaguing conventional delivery of healthcare is that doctors lack the time, knowledge, and frankly the interest in spending more time with their patients, hearing about their issues, then creating solutions that address their unique concerns. 

Enter the age of health coaches. A number of years ago, when I first heard about this phenomenon, of heath coaches playing a role in the delivery of health, I was skeptical. But over the past decade, as I’ve worked with health coaches, witnessed what they could accomplish, and heard plenty of positive feedback from the public engaging their services, my opinions about health coaching has completely changed. I now see them as part of the engine that will drive improvements in healthcare. 

I therefore tracked down Sandra Scheinbaum, a Phd clinical psychologist who counseled patients for many years but then diverted her career into functional medicine and health coaching, bringing the unique insights into human behavior and emotions that came from decades of practicing clinical psychology, now applied to health coaching. Dr. Scheinbaum founded the Functional Medicine Coaching Academy that educates and trains people in acquiring the skills and knowledge to practice as a health coach. She is also author of several books including Functional Medicine Coaching: Stories from the Movement That's Transforming Healthcare, and her newest book, Your Health Coach Will See You Now available in April 2025 on Amazon and selected bookstores. In this episode of Defiant Health, Dr. Scheinbaum recounts how she made this change in direction and what she foresees for the future of this important phenomenon of health coaching.

For more information:

FunctionalMedicineCoaching.org

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YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@WilliamDavisMD

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Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed