by Connie Hernandez, N.D.
When patients complain to us of a poorly functioning immune system, we generally find that the issue is actually an underactive immune system.
There’s often a history of endless cycles of repeated illness, with slow or incomplete recovery.
Or they may present with a history of having been horribly ill, with a high fever and a multitude of symptoms.
Our perspective as naturopathic doctors is admittedly unconventional.
In the first place, we consider that there are always two major factors at work in illness. The first is the virulence of the organism responsible for the ailment, and the second is the receptivity of the host.
A dramatic response to a virulent organism actually reflects of a strong and healthy immune system!
The immune system responds with fever as part of its effort to defend against disease. Small children will often spike a very high fever in response to a bug, then they’ll be just fine in a couple of days – while the mom who didn’t have sufficiently strong resources to spike a fever will be ill for days.
In this case, the child has the stronger immune system.
When children or adults manifest a longstanding pattern of falling ill over and over, we begin by looking for the underlying causes.
Suboptimal thyroid function, low vitamin D, or a deficiency of iron, B12, or folic acid may have predisposed the patient to illness.
Other missing nutrients, such as zinc or selenium, may also play a part.
We might therefore begin with conventional laboratory testing, or with intracellular nutrient testing to discover what the immune system might be lacking.
In the face of faulty digestion or absorption, we might recommend intravenous delivery of the needed nutrients directly to the cells.
Suboptimal lifestyle habits will, of course, compound the problem.
Sugar, for example, depresses the white blood cell count.
After Easter or Halloween, children don’t fall ill more easily than usual because the air is “filled with more bugs” at this time of year, but because their white count has no way to recover as long as they continue to bombard it hour after hour with sugary junk foods.
Many years ago, Dr. Marcel and I worked at an insurance company that had developed a wellness phone line for its clients.
During the annual flu shot campaign, Dr. Marcel and I refused the shots and joined a group of employees who were interested in supporting their immune systems as an alternative to the flu shots.
Our follow-up data showed that our un-injected group had far fewer sick days and fewer cases of the flu!
It’s always much better to take steps to prevent a problem than to wait till you’ve got it, then scramble to try to overcome it.
Whenever you do need to overcome an illness, there are many tools that can help you strengthen and support your immune system.
For example, we use thymic protein to support the function of the thymus gland, plus other nutrients and botanicals to increase the function of the immune system’s natural killer cells.
We use IV Vitamin C as an antiviral, hot and cold contrast therapies to bring immune response to the area of the body affected by disease, and energy medicine to help resolve any underlying energy-related issues.
When the concern is an overactive immune system, there are a multitude of other factors worth considering.
The over-reactivity of the immune system may be a result of autoimmunity.
Autoimmunity often occurs at times of major stress or major life transitions. High cortisol, major hormonal change, use of antibiotics, and gastrointestinal illnesses all disrupt the lining of the gut.
As the gut lining becomes permeable, larger particles of food are able to pass through than is healthy.
The immune system recognizes these particles as invaders and raises defenses against the large particles, and as a result the person develops food sensitivities. Cross-reactivity occurs, and the body starts fighting itself.
In treating autoimmune processes, we need to take account of all these considerations.
In addition, we’ll address the aberrant cell signaling mechanisms that are telling the immune system to attack what it shouldn’t be attacking.
For us as naturopaths, autoimmune thyroid disease is not simply a thyroid disease, inflammatory bowel disease is not simply a digestive disorder, and rheumatoid arthritis is not simply a joint disorder.
These conditions are autoimmune conditions, and must be addressed both in terms of autoimmunity and in terms of the body system affected.
There are many other factors that may play into immune system function – from environmental threats, to social influences, and from laughter, to love, to purpose.
As naturopaths, our constant effort is to uncover and work with the predominant influences affecting the immune functioning of the individual patient.
Drs. Connie (Ruhia) and Marcel (Mahavir) Hernandez
836 W. El Camino Real
Mountain View, CA 94040
DrConnie@DrsHernandez.com
DrMarcel@DrsHernandez.com
650-282-5176 (voice)
(leave us a message)
650-447-2622 (fax)