Nutritional therapy provides the body with the correct balance of nutrients needed to maximise your health, help overcome heath concerns and also regulate weight. Vitamins and minerals are essential for every reaction in the body and so deficiency can severely limit the ability of the body to work properly.

Nutritional therapy isn't simply about treating symptoms but about working on underlying causes of health problems and balancing the body; enabling it to work effectively.

As nutritional therapy involves giving the body the nutrients it needs to work as effectively as possibly, any health condition can be supported. Conditions from autoimmune disease, MS, ME, digestive problems incuding IBS, migraine, hormonal imbalance, depression, skin problems such as eczema and dermatitis, thyroid problems, low energy and weight concerns and any other concern can be supported through making changes in your diet.

This is hard to say without understanding the heath concern in question but can be discussed in detail before an individual programme is developed. The length of the programme is also based on what you want to achieve in terms of your goals for health. Some people find that they can take big steps themselves towards their goals with the right guidance and some require more support and can only manage a small step at a time; it ireally is whatever works for you. At the end of the day, nutritional guidance is about providing the client with the ability to support their own health.

Usually an initial consultation lasts one hour and involves detailed discussion of your health or weight concern. A questionnaire will be filled in prior to the consultation and this will be analysed at the first consultation. Once an understanding of the health problems has developed and potential underlying causes considered, a programme is developed that is achievable for the individual bearing in mind factors such as lifestyle, job, dietary preferences and time. A follow up consultation lasts approximately half an hour. In this, discussion of the symptoms and health changes allows the programme to be progressed to continue the support.

No! This is an individual choice. However, it is often beneficial to give the body a boost with the correct nutrients whilst you are making changes in your diet. This is to enable you to get back to health as quickly as possible. It can also be difficult in some situations to get all of the nutrients required for therapeutic support purely from your diet, particularly due to the intense agricultural and industrial processing our food is now subjected to.

If you are taking medication or have existing or previous health problems, it is important to inform your practitioner and this can be factored into your programme. There may be some contra-indications with medication and certain nutrients. As long as the practitioner is aware of this, the programme can be tailored accordingly.

No, not with the right support! A diet is normally associated with restriction and starving whilst a nutritional programme is certainly not that. Providing your body with the right balance of nutrients will increase the variety of your diet and support you in maximising your health. Many clients tell me that it is the first diet they have been able to stick to because they don't feel ike they are dieting ... they are supporting their health. The provision of support and an individually tailored, realistic programme that can be built upon over time, makes following it very achievable.

That is really an individual assessment based upon your health concern and also what you want to achieve. It is important not to just focus on cutting foods out of the diet but also what can be added in in place of these foods so that you won't feel hungry or deprived. It is usually not necessary to have long periods of exclusion for lots of foods unless there are specific health concerns.

Firstly, it is important to have tried them to make sure this is the case but if you don't like a particular food, regardless of its health benefits, alternatives can be found. It is important that your diet is enjoyable so that you can stick to it in the longer term.