1975 seems like only yesterday I had just started my internship after medical school and my first patient responsibility was a dying premature baby in the intensive care nursery. He was born with an intestinal problem and couldn’t be fed. In those days the idea of giving nutrients intravenously was just being experimented upon but because the baby was dying, we decided to give it a try.
It was remarkable how quickly the baby perked up. Before long the baby was thriving and eventually left the hospital to lead a normal life.
Since that first day, the idea of being able to give vitamins, minerals, protein, carbohydrate and fat though one’s veins has not only intrigued me, it has become a standard of care anytime a patient’s nutrition is deemed in jeopardy. Today, most major hospitals have an entire team devoted to the administration of this life saving fluid.
I suppose that my patients are lucky because my experience as a surgeon has provided me more than 35 years of expertise in the area of intravenous nutrition and the number of patients whose lives I have saved is countless.
Why is it that intravenous nutrition has not made the same sort of impact on the care of patients in the everyday practice of medicine. The major reason why this is so is because it’s not a drug that big pharma can make millions on, so it hasn’t received wide attention. It’s not taught in medical schools because its something used mostly by surgeons and specialists in hospitals so unless a young physician is going into a specialty that uses it on a regular basis, there is no way to get the experience needed to care for patients using this approach.
It’s clear that for a number of reasons, our gut doesn’t absorb much of the nutrients that we consume. The facts suggest that we only get about 8% of what we swallow at best. It’s no wonder that your doctor will give patients a Vitamin B shot every once in a while. But, that’s the limit of what most physicians will do. The reality is that intravenously administered nutrients are absorbed 100% by your system, so this is a powerful therapy and highly effective when its indicated
Our approach to intravenous supplementation is based on the needs of the individual. Like all of our therapies, there is no one-size-fits all approach. We prefer to measure what you need through proper testing first, then we give you what your body is deficient in so that we can restore your system to it’s proper balance and have you feeling better than you’ve probably felt in years.