Introducing the Naturopathic Children’s Health Clinic at OIHC

For those of you familiar with From Belly to Baby, you know that I have used this space to write about nutrition during pregnancy. Starting with this issue, however, I will be changing my topic to focus on natural approaches to children's health.

Starting on September 1st, the Ottawa Integrative Health Centre will be offering an expanded range of services for children's health. I was inspired to create this practice specialty in response to current trends in conventional pediatric care, such as:

• Refusing to treat children who are not vaccinated or whose parents are seeking a modified vaccine schedule;
• Lack of current information on healthy nutrition, breastfeeding and supplementation;
• Limited access to primary care; and
• Dependence on pharmaceuticals for common childhood illnesses.

The goal of the OIHC Naturopathic Children's Health Clinic is to fill these gaps by providing a holistic, individualized health care option for children from birth to age 15. It will accomplish this through the following commitments:

• Welcoming: We have friendly doctors and staff who enjoy helping children.
• Respect: We provide an environment that is respectful, non-judgmental, and allows parents to discuss their concerns.
• Choice: We empower parents with information so they can make informed decisions.
• Care: We provide exemplary medical care utilizing naturopathic principles and treatments, including a thorough assessment of your child, diagnosis, timely treatment, and referral where appropriate.
• Accessibility: We commit to short wait times, home visits, and email/phone availability after business hours.
• Time: Visits are a minimum of 30 minutes in length, allowing time for discussions and answering your questions.
• Education: We present seminars on whole foods nutrition, vaccination information, natural first aid and homeopathy for children and families.

Some of the expanded services we will be offering include baby visits from birth to 24 months, seminars on flu prevention, natural first aid, and vaccine information, after hours phone consultations for acute conditions, and a high quality natural children's dispensary for your convenience. A full day seminar being developed for autumn 2010 will teach families how to use homeopathic remedies for acute conditions, and will allow telephone access to an ND for after hours consultations.

And of course, you can read articles focusing on naturopathic approaches to children's health right here. I welcome any suggestions from readers on topics they would like to see covered in future issues of From Belly to Baby.