College Prep
Help your child stay healthy and safe as they leave home for the first time through holistic family medicine.
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College Prep at hol+
College Prep is designed to ensure that your child is equipped and ready for college in three main areas:
Nutritional Risk
Which foods to eat and avoid based on your child's unique body chemistry
Hormonal Risk
How your child's hormones affect his or her health and happiness at college
Toxicity Risk
What your child should know about his or her personal risk for drug and alcohol use
Our teens and young adults face new challenges today. Escalating rates of mental health disorders, hormone imbalances, nutrient depletion and early onset of inflammation are realities for children entering high school and college. Alcohol and drug abuse is rampant with many “benign” drugs acting as gateway drugs or now laced with fentanyl or other harmful ingredients.
The good news is that starting to prep and educate your children early on their personal chemistry, risk tolerance and early warning signs of disease risk or mental health instability arms them with the ability to own their health- and to reach out when in crisis.
Core Elements of the hol+ High School and College Prep Program
Watching the threats and risks to children over the last 20 years is the motivation for the hol+ High School and College Prep program. By merging Eastern and Western medicine, we are able to provide parents and adolescents a blueprint for their health.
Depression/Anxiety Screening
With depression and anxiety on the rise, teens need not only academic skills to thrive in the classroom, but emotional problem-solving skills to handle challenges and the ebbs and flows of life.
Depression and anxiety manifest in teens in many different ways. Teenagers often show irritability and anger rather than the sadness that is typically associated with depression. Other symptoms include withdrawal/isolation, loss of interest in activities they previously found interesting, excessive sleep, racing thoughts, panic attacks, and appetite changes.
At hol+, we screen teens for depression not only through their symptoms but also through their chemistry. We look at mental health through a more holistic lens, factoring in gut health, nutritional imbalances, genetic predispositions, inflammation, and hormonal imbalances, to get a more complete picture of why your teen feels the way they do. Their genes, gut microbiomes, and even the coffee they drink can hugely impact your teen’s mood and ability to face and handle the challenges of college. Small changes can make all the difference. These include understanding the major integrative medicine patterns of health and personalizing our recommendations for your child.
Testing for these patterns includes:
Eating Disorders
Eating disorders can occur at any age, but the transition to college is the time during which teens are most at risk. EDs are usually triggered by the increased workload, decreased structure, and new social pressures that college entails. The combination of stress and pre-existing anxiety, low self-esteem, or learning issues create the perfect storm from which eating disorders develop.
Eating disorders typically occur when a need to exert control over a stressful environment manifests as food restriction, bingeing/purging, over-exercise, and unhealthy body image.
Eating disorders are best treated through a collaborative approach with therapists, nutritionists, and medical professionals. At CSMD, we focus on balancing the body’s response to the stress that precipitates eating disorders. We also focus on correcting nutritional imbalances, vitamin deficiencies, and hormonal imbalances that contribute to the body’s stress response.
5 key integrative health imbalances to look for with eating disorders include:
Hormone Imbalance and Contraception
Understanding hormones, and your teen’s ability to metabolize hormones plays into mental, cognitive and physical health. This also determines best contraception options and triggers a discussion around safe sex. It is imperative to screen for the following hormone patterns and help your adolescent understand how to balance this pattern efficiently.
Immune Health
Upon leaving home, many adolescents find that they are susceptible to many viruses, mold, and environmental toxins. A part of our High School and College Prep program focuses on optimization of the immune system, to decrease the threshold for getting sick. We know that sleep cycles will be disrupted - but what does that mean for your child.
Immune system optimization includes:
Alcohol and Substance Abuse
Substance abuse is on the rise and tends to be the most prominent amongst college students. One study found that half of participating college students qualified for at least one substance use disorder. College is a time of exploration, freedom, and pushing boundaries. At CSMD, our pediatric team helps your child understand his/her unique biochemistry and how it affects their risk for substance abuse disorders.
What substances do college students abuse the most?
- Marijuana
- Alcohol
- Hallucinogens (like ecstasy, MDMA, mushrooms)
- Cocaine
- Stimulants (like Adderall, Vyvanse, Focalin)
4 key integrative imbalances to look for with alcohol/substance abuse disorders include:
General Self Care
Identifying stress that is overwhelming and the ability to then reduce that feeling through proper self care is a critical life skill.
We work with our teens and young adults to scan and recognize abnormal stress cues including:
Having three or more of the above is a sign of increased or at risk stress and warrants activation of a self care plan that could include: