Supporting Clinicians to Support their Patients

The Clinician Integrative Mental Health Program was created to raise the standard of proficiency of health professionals in addressing complex mental health concerns such as anxiety, bipolar disorders and depression using a mind, body, spirit approach. It explores mental illness through the lenses of trauma, psychoneuroimmunology,pathophysiology, epigenetics, and patient-centered compassionate management. The program is evidence-based yet holistic, considering the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects of health as vital parts of an integrative system that is capable of healing.

This course is for clinicians that want to grow in clinical practice and help their patients or clients in addressing the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects of health. If you are a health professional, therapist, mental health advocate, nutritionist or health coach - this course is for you! 

Initially, you will learn about the role of neurotransmitters, hormones, environmental toxins, diet, sleep, and exercise. This is the foundation to gaining a deeper understanding of the connection between mental and physical health. You will learn to identify the multiple factors that influence one’s mental state. We will explore substantial research about the connection between exercise, diet, and mental health, and how to teach patients to implement positive routines in their lives using motivational interviewing skills.

Having established the physical foundations for for mental well-being, we dive into the inner work required to improve  mental health. In light of neuroplasticity & epigenetics and drawing from my extensive experience of treating patients with mental health concerns, we will discover how to shift distorted thought patterns. Subsequently, we will focus on how to break the thought-emotion cycle, how to manage stress and burnout, and the importance of setting & maintaining healthy boundaries. Emotional avoidance & nervous system activation through anger, denial, distraction, and addiction are discussed in terms of recognition and management. You will learn how to teach your patients to “live without the storyline”, regardless of their trauma history.

In subsequent lectures, I will outline models that address struggles around willpower and motivation, and then explain the impact of environmental stimuli on mental health. Finally, we will discover the power of self-compassion, address trauma pattern, and understand how to shift core, limiting and shadow beliefs. You will learn practical tools and resources that you can use with your patients to help them connect to their inner resources, establishing the foundation for healing and lasting change.

The better you understand the factors and root causes that influence your patient’s mental state, the more you can empower him/her to heal. You can educate your patient about positive and negative influences on mental health and suggest powerful changes that have lasting effects. A healthy diet, as well as a regular exercise and healthy sleep schedule are the very foundation for mental wellbeing. However, you have to have the skills to be able to empower your patients to make these changes. In this program, Dr. Chris.nd helps you understand what is holding people back from making simple (or big) changes and how you can empower them to take corrective action in their lives, once and for all.

It is when you are able to identify unhealthy beliefs and thought patterns, and have done the necessary inner trauma work to understand them, that can you truly support your patient in dealing with their thoughts and emotions. The beauty of this work is that you will become a practitioner that embodies what you teach - truly exemplifying the naturopathic principle of "Docere: Doctor as Teacher". You will support your patient in identifying, accepting and shifting unhealthy thought patterns and addressing emotions from a perspective of wholesome compassion and curiosity.

The techniques you will learn in this program will help you support your patient in introducing lasting changes. The seeds of change will grow in the fertile ground you and your patient have been nuturing together.

The power of self-compassion, the spiritual principles of love, acceptance, mercy, grace and forgiveness that you study in this course will serve as inspiration for your patient. By integrating the teachings & practicing the exercises, your patients will have a renewed perspective informed by self-compassion that ultimately leads to healing. 

What makes me a unique teacher is that I bring not only my clinicial experience to the table, but also my lived experience and journey of healing. 

While I was doing my undergraduate degree at UBC in the late 1980’s, I experienced debilitating depression and anxiety. I also had an eating disorder (bulimia) and was not coping with the stress I was under. After taking medication that was initially prescribed to alleviate depression, I swung into a psychotic manic episode and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder type 1.

At that time, I did not accept myself and lived with the shame and stigma of mental health labels. In the aftermath of surviving a suicide attempt, I realized after reading “A Return to Love” by Marianne Williamson that I didn't love or accept myself. And thus begain the long road to recovery and my journey of healing.

The sole reason I became a Naturopathic Doctor was because when I was struggling with my illness, there weren’t many natural experts in the field. I created this course to teach practitioners how to support their patients using a holistic approach mind, body, spirit approach.  I firmly believe something is trying to be born in someone that is struggling. And we don't have to struggle as much as we think. 

It is through my own journey of healing my past traumas, restoring the physical foundation of health and addressing my thoughts, emotions and learning to trust in spirit, that I have regained my mental health over the past 40 years. Western medicine helped me survive, but Naturopathic Medicine helped me thrive in my life.

This program combines my education as a Naturopathic Doctor with the additional training I have in 6 types of counselling: Compassionate Inquiry (Dr. Gabor Mate) Gestalt psychotherapy, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (Christine Padesky), Compassion-focused therapy (Paul Gilbert), Integrative Reprogramming Technique, and Mindfulness based therapy (Eckhart Tolle, Jon Kabat Zinn, Pema Chodron + others). I have taken this knowledge and training and created a solution based course that teaches you how to help your patients manage their mental & emotional health. They say you are only able to guide pateints as far as you have gone yourself - I have invested the time, gone to the retreats, read the books, invested the money, taken the courses from the masters in the area of trauma, mindfulness, compassion and mindbody medicine, so that I am able to guide you in helping your patients regain their mental health.

There are two ways to participate in the course:

Option 1: LIVE Weekly interactive 90-minute calls with Dr. Chris.nd for psychoeducation, questions and community connection + access to the recorded teachings. The total online program is 12.5 hours & is Category A CE approved by CONO. Homework and resources are given to participants between weekly videos. The LIVE 

Option 2: Self-paced program where you have access to the recorded webinars for 1 year. The total online program is 12.5 hours & is Category A CE approved by CONO. Homework and resources are given to participants between weekly videos.

Please email [email protected] or call the clinic at 587-521-3595 for more information. I am looking forward to working with you!

“The course is a unique learning experience. Not only will you learn relevant, practical and tangible clinical information to utilize with patients right away, you will also learn the importance of ‘physician, heal thyself,’ which can often be missing in professional educational courses, allowing you to put into practice what you’re learning.”
~ Dr. N. ND

“Dr. Chris. nd draws upon her own personal and professional experiences in the area of mental health in an engaging and dynamic way, sharing personal and clinical examples, concepts, techniques, & tools learned from various sources providing a foundation for acquiring knowledge and skills for an effective and integrated approach in serving others. The group setting was intimate, supportive and relaxed, with invitation to share, discuss or just listen. I enjoyed my experience and I’m sure you will enjoy it as well.”
~ Dr. H. ND

“I found the course helpful for myself personally as well as in my own practice. The course was very integrative, and included aspects of the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual components of mental health. I would recommend this course to anyone wanting to expand their naturopathic approaches to mental health care.”
~ Dr. M, ND

“I wanted to thank you for your course. It was really nice to have reassurance that what I had been doing in practice was the right direction. But it had also provided quite a few insights that have been fundamentally helpful for not only my practice, but for myself.
I would love to stay informed of future courses you may offer for practitioners.
Thank you, again!”
~ Dr. L. ND

“I found the course to be very informative as a clinician and also for myself. Dr. Chris. nd presented information in a way that was practical and easy to understand. She presented concepts that I could easily integrate into my practice. I particularly enjoyed the “homework” self-reflection sessions, as it allowed me to reflect on my own health and wellbeing throughout the course.”
~ Dr. V. ND