by Kay Lucas

With spring budding all around you, you might be checking to see if your plants have come back from hibernation. When a tree is sick, you might notice the leaves aren’t growing or the branches are brittle. Is there any green left in there? Any good gardener will tell you to check the soil and fertilize and treat the roots to ensure the tree has the nutrients it needs to thrive.

Just like a tree, humans need to assess their symptoms and find the root cause of the problem. That’s what
LivingWell Integrative Healthcare is all about. 

While most medical practices will treat your symptoms, often prescribing one pill after another, LivingWell looks at the bigger picture to treat the problem, therefore, relieving you of the symptom. By digging deeper to find the root cause, they strive to provide “healthcare” instead of “disease care.” 

In January 2006, Clif Caldwell, MD, and Cheryl Middleton, PA-C, opened the doors to LivingWell Integrative Healthcare with a shared goal—a better approach to treating patients. They wanted their practice to be set apart from general primary healthcare options. 

The team at LivingWell Integrative Healthcare strives to give one-on-one care, developing a relationship with you. They are a small practice with three practitioners: Caldwell, Middleton, and Tracey Schofield, Jr., NP-C. LivingWell is always accepting new patients and scheduling appointments so that you spend more time with your care provider and less time waiting in the lobby. 

At LivingWell, by focusing on finding the cause of your symptoms, they’re able to personalize a whole-body treatment to meet your individual needs. You build a relationship with your practitioner since you see the same provider at each appointment, unlike in many larger healthcare offices where you see whichever doctor is available that day.

Because LivingWell Integrative Healthcare offers a full spectrum of advanced laboratory tests that are not always easily obtained elsewhere, they can identify the root cause of your problems and build a holistic treatment plan.

“Balance is key,” Middleton says. “When I was practicing before [opening LivingWell], you basically traded a symptom for a pill. For example, your knee hurts, here is an anti-inflammatory; you can’t sleep, here is a sleeping pill.” Middleton explains how LivingWell’s Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy helps their patients. “What the hormones do, is restore things back to physiologic optimal. And so, a lot of those things naturally get better, [especially] if the person is willing to not eat junk like fast food or packaged/processed food.”  

Along with Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy, LivingWell offers a long list of services, such as management of thyroid dysfunction including patients who have Hashimoto’s Disease, management of adrenal fatigue, and weight loss programs using an HCG diet. To find the best treatment services, LivingWell provides various screenings such as saliva hormone testing; thermography for breast and other areas of the body, including full body; micronutrient testing for vitamin and mineral levels; Cleveland Heart Lab testing for advanced lipid, metabolic, and fatty acid levels; heavy metal testing; food sensitivity testing; and neurotransmitter testing with other specialized tests upon request.

“Neurotransmitter testing will help with treatment of things like anxiety, ADD, etc., by helping to determine WHERE the imbalance is so we can help know what someone is lacking (or overproducing) in order to restore balance,” Middleton explains.

You do not need to be a patient at LivingWell Integrative Healthcare to use their testing services, but you will need someone to read the results and provide treatment if necessary. This means you can come in just for their advanced technology, such as thermographic breast imaging, instead of getting a mammogram. This less invasive exam shows the physiologic changes before a mass forms—which can take years—therefore, catching cancer earlier.

“Our goal is to get to the root [of the problem],” says Middleton. From their holistic approach to the relationships they are building, LivingWell Integrative Healthcare is a step apart from general healthcare.

LivingWell Integrative Healthcare is the area’s pioneer of Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy. Recently celebrating their 17th anniversary, LivingWell is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, integrative healthcare practices in the Upstate. 

LivingWell Integrative Healthcare is located at 838 Powdersville Road, Suite G, in Easley. For more infomation, call 864-850-9988 or visit: LivingWellHealthcare.com.