In this episode, Dr. Paul Bekkum discusses the reverse neuropathy program at All Seasons Integrative Health. He outlines the initial assessment process, the severity levels of neuropathy, and the corresponding treatment plans. The conversation emphasizes the importance of personalized care, dietary changes, and advanced therapies to help patients manage and potentially reverse their neuropathy. Dr. Bekkum also highlights the significance of long-term management and the role of patient dedication in achieving successful outcomes.
Takeaways
Initial assessment is crucial for determining neuropathy severity. Five categories of neuropathy severity guide treatment plans. An anti-inflammatory diet can significantly aid recovery. Home therapies can complement in-office treatments. K laser therapy promotes nerve regeneration and healing. 93% of patients see improvement with the right treatment. Long-term management is essential for severe neuropathy cases. Patient dedication is key to successful recovery. Regular evaluations help track progress and adjust care. Medications may mask symptoms but do not address root causes.
Sound Bites
"You can't live with the pain anymore." "Following instructions is key for recovery." "If you want real results, give us a call."
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Neuropathy and Initial Assessment 02:50 Understanding Neuropathy Severity Levels 06:12 Treatment Plans for Neuropathy 09:02 Advanced Therapies for Severe Neuropathy 11:48 Long-term Management and Maintenance Care 14:49 Conclusion and Call to Action
Chapters
Summary
In this episode, Dr. Paul Bekkum discusses the reverse neuropathy program at All Seasons Integrative Health. He outlines the initial assessment process, the severity levels of neuropathy, and the corresponding treatment plans. The conversation emphasizes the importance of personalized care, dietary changes, and advanced therapies to help patients manage and potentially reverse their neuropathy. Dr. Bekkum also highlights the significance of long-term management and the role of patient dedication in achieving successful outcomes.
Takeaways
Initial assessment is crucial for determining neuropathy severity. Five categories of neuropathy severity guide treatment plans. An anti-inflammatory diet can significantly aid recovery. Home therapies can complement in-office treatments. K laser therapy promotes nerve regeneration and healing. 93% of patients see improvement with the right treatment. Long-term management is essential for severe neuropathy cases. Patient dedication is key to successful recovery. Regular evaluations help track progress and adjust care. Medications may mask symptoms but do not address root causes.
Sound Bites
"You can't live with the pain anymore." "Following instructions is key for recovery." "If you want real results, give us a call."
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Neuropathy and Initial Assessment 02:50 Understanding Neuropathy Severity Levels 06:12 Treatment Plans for Neuropathy 09:02 Advanced Therapies for Severe Neuropathy 11:48 Long-term Management and Maintenance Care 14:49 Conclusion and Call to Action
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Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Hello, and welcome to the Extraordinary Health podcast. I'm your host, doctor Paul Beckham. This podcast is sponsored by All Seasons Integrative Health. And today, we're gonna be going over the reverse neuropathy program at All Seasons Integrative Health. I know that most of you, you know, if you're suffering with neuropathy or just even tired of living with the pain, the numbness, the tingling, the burning, you know, the difficulty sleeping.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
It's just something you just, you know, can't live with anymore. And, you know, that's in our office where we wanna be able to help you here. There are steps that you can take, to help, at least, first, evaluate and determine, you know, what you have going on with neuropathy here. And that first step is just giving the office a call so we can get you in for an initial evaluation, and we can determine the severity of your neuropathy or, basically, the severity of your nerve damage. That initial assessment, you know, from there, we can give you a good idea then of just what kind of treatment we're gonna need to do to help reverse your neuropathy.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So let's get into that, you know, initial assessment here. Your initial assessment is gonna consist of, sensory tests like we just talked about here so we can find out what kind of nerve damage you have going on. We have some thermography that we're gonna do to determine, you know, just, you know, how much blood flow is being affected in your body, how we're seeing decreased blood flow in the feet and the hands. We're also gonna be going over history with you. If you have, you know, any other labs that you've had done outside of the clinic, we will request those to get into the office because, a lot of those, even though they might have turned up in a normal range, we're gonna look at them from a functional medicine perspective.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So we're gonna be looking at, are you optimal, not just are you average. So, after you've had that initial assessment done, and I guess one other thing to note here too is some of these patients who might be listening to the podcast, we can send you into your home. It's basically a scale where we can do what's called a pseudo motor test, which will give us an idea of how your body is being affected by your neuropathy. And that scale sends information right to us, and we can give you an idea then of what you can do with your neuropathy there. There are completely at home treatments that could be done.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
There is a cost for purchasing the the scale, as well as ongoing costs. We try and keep those to a minimum for you here, but, it it could be something that can be super helpful for you if you already know you have neuropathy going on and you wanna be able to just do at home treatments, by utilizing the scale and getting measurements for us once a week. We can make sure that you're on track, with your neuropathy treatment and, you know, you're getting things better. If they're not, well, then we might need to get you into the office to do, some more advanced treatments. That would be more than what you're you're beginning to be doing with your home therapies.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So after we've kinda found out, that initial assessment there as far as the severity of your neuropathy, we're gonna customize a treatment plan for you. And we basically have kind of 5 categories here or levels of neuropathy that we're finding. 1 is a minimal neuropathy. You know, you're you're starting to have some of the effects of it. You're seeing that decreased blood flow.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
You're starting to get the numbness and tingling periodically, and, you know, it might come and go. It might hang in there for a while. Most of the the patients that are in this status, we're gonna be able to just treat predominantly with some supplements to help get that blood flow restored. Because once you start to lose the blood flow to the nerves, that's when you start to get the odd sensations and it starts to lead to things like difficulty sleeping and as it progresses on even to balance issues. Other things that we'll go over is an anti inflammatory diet, to help remove things that might be, you know, causes some inflammation that could be causing, the blood flow to be restricted to your hands and feet.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
This can be a very helpful thing, in just removing inflammation throughout your entire body. So not just helping out the neuropathy, but also just decreasing inflammation. Some people have other conditions going on like osteoarthritis, gut health issues. A lot of times if a person has some problems with their gut, that's gonna manifest as some systemic inflammation. And if we can get you on an anti inflammatory diet, that can help out significantly in helping to, decrease, you know, the the stress on the blood flow there.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So you can get that blood flow going out to those nerves again to help the neuropathy. The next level, we're getting into mild neuropathy here now. And with that, now we're gonna start to look at adding in kind of some home, therapies that you can be doing. And one is what's called anodyne therapy. That's where you're gonna be using an infrared light that helps to improve circulation.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
It gets applied, in your lower legs to your calf and to your feet to help improve that blood flow. If your hands and, forearms are are involved here, we'll have you utilizing it there as well. The other thing that we use is a rebuilder therapy, which is an electric stim therapy. It's very similar to our PEMF therapy that we have in the office. It is run at a frequency of 7.8 hertz, to help normalize the nerves again.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So it's very helpful in helping to restore the nerves to their normal status, but we do need to get that blood flow back as well. Once people kinda move past, this mild phase here and they're getting into a moderate phase, I guess I should kinda roll back a little bit here. Everything that we did in the minimal, neuropathy phase is gonna get done in the mild phase. And, again, now, like, in the moderate phase, everything that we did in the first two phases is gonna get included with the the moderate phase. But now we're gonna start to look at doing some, you know, comprehensive in office therapy here to help reverse the neuropathy.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
I've found that the people that are utilizing the in home therapies, the the rebuilder and the anodyne, you know, might still do well here, but a lot of times, we still do need get to get them into the office to help just restore the normal, you know, cellular health to their body. And we're gonna use some more higher powered things like our, PEMF therapy. That's gonna help kinda repair and just reduce inflammation in the cells and tissues of the body. We're also gonna use our k laser therapy here, which helps to promote nerve regeneration, angiogenesis, so helping those blood vessels regrow to help get better blood flow and nutrients to the nerves for them to heal up. And by doing that, you're gonna get pain relief as well.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
It also helps reduce inflammation, or might even at this phase as well, kinda customize your nutritional supplements a little bit further where we're gonna either utilize labs you've already had done or even order some new ones for you so that we can look a little deeper and find out just where you might have some areas that are getting stressed that are needing some extra nutritional support or dietary changes or even some different lifestyle changes. Then we move into kinda the the next level or the, severe neuropathy. And, again, that's gonna include everything in the first three phases here. But now, we're gonna start to add in things like our focus shockwave therapy, which helps to, again, stimulate some of the soft tissues. It's gonna help decrease pain and inflammation, and especially when people are starting to get affected in their feet.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
This can help turn things around rather quickly for people. And a lot of patients are starting to notice, like, wow, I can actually start to feel things again that I couldn't feel before, like the fiber in my carpet. I can feel the socks on my feet. It's it's kinda crazy sometimes to just hear the comments, when people just haven't been able to feel things, because of how the nerves are being affected, especially in their feet, but also in their hands. So we'll also be doing some just ongoing more of the k laser therapy.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
And we might end this into some different programming, a little more intense programming that we use, from the Laser Therapy Institute. But we're also gonna, you know, make sure that you're keeping up with that diet and nutrition because now we're really, really, keyed in on that here. Again, we're probably gonna be ordering some labs if you haven't had them done, to make sure that we're customizing any kind of nutrition or or dietary recommendations, that are necessary to help reverse the neuropathy. And the last phase is the extreme neuropathy. I mean, these people are are it's like the danger line here.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
I mean, this is where we're starting to see people coming in. They already are starting to develop some ulcers. Toes are purple. They're right on the edge of of probably getting an infection and possibly, you know, looking at to have, some amputations done. And these people just need a a complete reboot of the system here.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So, here, we're gonna hit it with everything that we've had before, but just even more intense. They're gonna be in a little more frequently right away just to help try and get things reversed, get the if they have some diabetic ulcers going on, you know, get those healed up as quickly as possible. The laser works awesome with that. If that's not the case, then we're gonna have to make sure we get you sent off and referred out to, somebody can help deal with that for you. The big thing with the extreme neuropathy patients, it just takes longer to get this stuff reversed.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Sometimes it it has gone too far and, you know, we're we're not gonna be able to get it taken care of. But, what we've been seeing in the office is, you know, somewhere in the order of 93% or greater of patients, improving and reversing their neuropathy. The biggest change that we're gonna see is gonna be in the 1st 90 days. But once we get out to the extreme end of the spectrum here, we're looking at somebody who's gonna be treated, you know, on an ongoing basis, probably for the rest of their life. So these people need to be diligent with everything that they do, probably wearing shoes in their house so they keep their feet protected, because of they're not feeling anything of the patients when I have them come in the office.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Hot, cold, sharp, dull, rough, smooth, you know, vibration, you know, they're failing our risk of fall assessments, which that's another test that gets done in the office as well. So, you know, step 3 then is, you know, after we've kinda determined, you know, the severity and exactly what you need to be doing here is just starting to implement the treatment here. So and those early phases there, it's just changing that nutrition. We'll get people followed up in, you know, 90 days with those minimally affected ones, just have them come back in. We'll redo all their testing again, see if we've got them back in range.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
We'll more than likely then just get them set up on an annual basis just to make sure that their neuropathy doesn't return for them. Once you get into that second phase or the mild neuropathy phase, you know, we're, again, gonna be retesting you, at possibly monthly basis. If you'd like to come in and just make sure that everything's going better there, at least doing the sensory screen again. But we'll be fully evaluating again at 90 days just to make sure that everything has, improved, and, you know, you're getting back closer to that normal sensory status, normal motor status. And, again, we'll have those patients follow-up on an annual basis as well.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Now once we get into the, you know, moderate neuropathy where you're gonna be getting that in office treatment, you're definitely getting evaluated on a monthly basis just to make sure that we're seeing improvement. Typically, these patients are gonna see, you know, some pretty significant improvement, usually within that 1st month or 2, and it continues to improve from there. The big thing is just following through with that anti inflammatory diet, taking their supplements, and, you know, making sure you're following up for your appointments in the office with all the therapies. Moving on to the, severe neuropathy there. Again, we're gonna be evaluating them, monthly as they come in for that 1st 90 days, then we'll be catching them about every 3 months after that.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
They'll have a care plan of of more than likely around a year, just to make sure everything's improved. That's where we've probably peaked out the maximum improvement. We can continue to see some improvement after that, but, we will continue to monitor them depending on their progress, either every 6 months or every, year at that point in time. Whereas, then moving on to the extreme neuropathy patients as stated before, you know, they're gonna have a treatment plan that's probably gonna extend out to 2 years just because, you know, we're not gonna see a huge significant change right away. We will start to see, you know, surface, blood flow improve.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Hopefully, we're gonna see if they have diabetic ulcers going on, those healing up. But, again, depending on how long it's been there for them, we need to work with them intensely, and they're gonna probably have intense treatment. At least for the 1st 90 days, it'll it'll back off to a little less frequent over the next 90 days. And, again, we'll adjust their treatment accordingly here, out till 2 years. But they're the ones that are going to need the most care, and the most time to make sure that we are getting them healed up.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
It's also gonna take a lot of dedication on the patient's side because it's something that you need to make sure that you're watching a lot of these things yourself so that, you know, you don't have problems because, you know, you get those cuts on your feet. And if they get infected, then, you know, that's gonna, you know, cause a huge setback here, and it might be something we need to refer you out to get treated elsewhere. So following instructions is key. So getting out to, you know, just the long term, once we've kinda gotten everybody back to where they should be at, again, it's just do they need some maintenance care or not? Some of the levels 1, you know, the minimal, mild and moderate.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
A lot of them might not need maintenance care. We're just gonna probably get them set up on evaluations, but more that moderate to severe and moving up to extreme. They're gonna need some maintenance care probably for the rest of their lives. And, you know, hey. We're here for you.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
You can come in and get evaluated. We'll be doing it probably as frequent as every 3 months, but it might stretch out to as much as a year, to get those evaluations as if as you're doing well, just to keep it that, short and sweet here. So, you know, why would you wanna come into All Seasons Integrative Health? I mean, we have the, most comprehensive treatment, nonpharmacological, nonsurgical treatment, for neuropathy, in the area and probably for, you know, hours away, if not, you know, states away from here. You've seen excellent results with people.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
Most people were gonna be able to let you know even on that initial evaluation. We do have a $49 discovery session, so you can come in. We can at least give you an idea of the severity that you have going on, with the neuropathy, And then you can kinda make a decision if you wanna be following through with treatment or not. We're just here to help. And if you want the help, we're more than happy to help you with it.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
So I hope this information was helpful for you. If this is something that you have going on or or maybe even you know somebody that, is a family member or friend, and they have neuropathy going on, you know, please share this information with them so that they can just be informed of some of the things that they could be doing to help themselves, you know, reverse their neuropathy and, you know, get off of the medications because even some of the medications that they put you on actually cause neuropathy. And almost all of the patients I have in my office, they've maxed out their dose, you know, usually after a year or 2, and they're stuck. They they're just not gonna go anywhere, and all the medications they're doing is just covering up the symptoms. So if you want some real results, give us a call.
Dr. Paul Bekkum:
701-356-0016. Or, you know, just reach out to us, and we'll get you set up and get you evaluated and see if you have neuropathy going on. If you do, we'll let you know what you have going on and what you do need to do to move forward. Thank you, and have a great day.