Laser and Aesthetic Center, National Center for Integrative Medicine, IL

Laser and Aesthetic Center, National Center for Integrative Medicine, IL

If you’ve listed “a healthier lifestyle” on your list of new year’s resolutions, you will soon have a broad spectrum of choices to get you there — all under one roof.

This spring, Dr. Rao Kilaru, emergency medicine physician at Provena Saint Joseph Medical Center in Joliet, will open the National Center for Integrative Medicine at 3100 Theodore St. in Joliet. The center blends three types of health practices: conventional, alternative and beautification.

“This center is the first of its kind in the country,” Kilaru said. “In 2009, 600 million people, twice the population of this country, visited an alternative medicine practitioner. Integrative medicine is the future because people want more choices than conventional medicine offers. We think 21st century medicine is going to include all the pieces: the conventional, the alterative and the beautification.”

The laser and aesthetics center, which hosts its grand opening March 2, will offer acne treatment, body contouring, Botox, dermal fillers, chemical peels, fractional resurfacing, Fusion 3D lift, hair reduction, pigmented/vascular lesion reduction, scar reduction, sclerotherapy, skin rejuvenation, skin tightening, spider vein removal, stretch mark reduction, tattoo removal and wrinkle reduction. The laser and aesthetics center is accepting patients 18 and up.

The complementary and alternative care center, which opens this spring, will offer a combination of traditional and alternative health care options to its wellness plan. These include chiropractic and physical therapy, acupuncture, homeopathy, naturopathy, nutrition, herbal medicine, yoga and meditation. All services will be housed in a single location. However, the center’s services do not replace those given by a primary care physician; they merely complement them.

“Traditional doctors, like me, were trained in our own box not to believe in anything other than what we do,” Kilaru said. “But the public demand for alternative medicine practices has increased and there is good reason for that.”

Kilaru said there is mounting evidence that some alternative and complementary therapies work as well as or better than traditional medicine alone, especially when the focus is on wellness or management of chronic diseases.

For example, why not use yoga for first-line anxiety management instead of medication, or use diet modifications for treating metabolic syndrome, lowering cholesterol levels, reducing high blood pressure and controlling blood sugar, if it works as well?

Kilaru underscores his point by adding that 20 academic institutions, including Harvard University and Duke University, offered clinical fellowships in integrative medicine. Some medical schools are also offering residency programs, too.

This implies that the focus of future health care will be on disease prevention instead of control of disease symptoms. As people begin to live healthier lives, they will want to look good, too.

During the evaluation, the patient will see traditional and alternative health professionals and receive a battery of laboratory and diagnostic tests. The patient will receive a written report, with recommendations to create a plan for wellness.