While it’s not a quick fix—doctors say, it can bring permanent results. “It does take a lot of effort. You have to bring your mind, your whole body and your whole heart into it and you have to be willing to make a commitment to changing things,” said Dr. Tatianna Pizzutto, a family medicine resident physician.
Lifestyle medicine is helping patients improve different areas of their health. “So from a medical perspective, we’re discussing how you sleep, your ability to eat healthy, exercise, whether you’re smoking and what your risk factors might be,” said Dr. Pizzutto.
Implementing lifestyle medicine can help patients combat chronic health concerns like diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, or fatigue. “For lifestyle medicine, we actually have clinics and sessions with patients here at our department where all we do is just lifestyle medicine. We talk about how can we prevent things and improve your health before things become a problem,” she said.
Blood work can also help doctors determine what vitamins and nutrients patients may be lacking. “You can get some big results by stopping bad habits, so say if you drink a lot or if you smoke a lot, you can try to make a quick fix by just cutting those out cold turkey, but what lifestyle medicine is really emphasizing is changing the way you’re living on a daily basis,” Dr. Pizzutto said.
Using a team of health experts like psychologists, nutritionists, physical therapists, and exercise specialists, patients can improve their overall health one step at a time.
View More Health Matters video segments at LeeHealth.org/Healthmatters/
Lee Health in Fort Myers, FL is the largest network of health care facilities in Southwest Florida and is highly respected for its expertise, innovation and quality of care. For more than 100 years, we’ve been providing our community with personalized preventative health services and primary care to highly specialized care services and robotic assisted surgeries. Lee Health – Caring People. Inspiring Care.
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