Portland, OR: In 2016, Grain Integrative Health will offer new lifestyle-based health programs in Portland, OR. Science now backs the pursuit of ageless life through the study of telomeres and DNA with the science of epigenetics at the center of the conversation.  Epigenetics claims we can change how we express genetic traits based on how we live our lives. Grain Integrative Health plans to address the concept of epigenetics in 2016, rolling out several lifestyle programs to increase access to personal medical data.

Grain Integrative Health physicians are in the center of this health revolution, and the clinic’s lifestyle programs will de-emphasize patient dependence on medications as the answer to poor dietary and lifestyle choices. Dr. Samuel Oltman states, “There is a pervasive belief today that aging goes hand-in-hand with disability and the loss of function. This belief is born out of seeing it happen to our grandparents, even our parents, but science informs us otherwise. The modern scientific medical community wants to teach us that the loss of function with age is mostly related to lifestyle choice, and our environment, rather than to biological age.” The doctors at Grain Integrative Health want to teach patients that living longer and better starts with the basics: food and movement. Proper nutrition from a plant-based, whole foods diet can increase energy, decrease joint and muscle pain, enhance cognition and prevent cancer, diabetes and heart disease.

The key to aging gracefully lies in the balance of choices; implementing those choices can take a team of assistance for many people, with help coming primarily from health care providers. Grain Integrative Health is a moderately sized clinic, with six primary care physicians licensed as Naturopathic Doctors, practicing with a spin on integrative primary care. The health clinic offers primary care, structural integration, acupuncture and Five Element Chinese medicine, and mental health care, now accepting most medical insurances and the new lifestyle-based programs will utilize each of these types of medicine.

Recently, and in preparation for the new program’s release, Grain Integrative Health sent Dr. Samuel Oltman, the newest addition to the extraordinary health care team at Grain Integrative Health in Portland, Oregon to spend a day sharing the clinic philosophy with Portlanders. Dr. Oltman is a good fit for their new programs which involve epigenetics, as he is a personal purveyor of healthy lifestyle. Dr. Oltman has a personal interest in sports and anti-aging lifestyle- he is an expert in nutritional, herbal, preventive and lifestyle medicine. By combining the latest research with individual and personal attention, Grain Integrative Health’s patients will experience the ideal mix of everything large-scale science paired with uniquely individualized health care.

The lifestyle based programs will avoid a disease-based approach; the physicians at Grain Integrative Health will partner with their patients to increase the possibility of weaning patients off of pharmaceutical medications. One of the trends the owners of the clinic noted were that patients become patients at Grain Integrative Health because they want to heal, or they want to reduce their dependency on drugs to live so they crafted these individualized healthcare programs to acknowledge the demands they are already addressing in a more formal context. Just as being on many medications can be dangerous, coming off of them can be just as dangerous so the physicians at Grain Integrative Health are experts in understanding the interactions of over the counter herbs and vitamins with pharmaceutical drugs.  Another area often over-looked, hormone enhancement and improved cognition, are other areas providers will address through the new programs.  One of the programs will cater to an out-of-state clientelle, and the staff can even help arrange a travel itinerary; a flight away should never feel too far away to travel for this type of individualized healthcare.