There are six main Naturopathic Principles

Vis Medicatrix Naturae – The Healing Power of Nature

There is a self ordering, self healing creative force present in all life, if not in all matter. Promote vitality, live in harmony with the laws of nature, and remove obstacles or drains to vital force.  

Primum Non Nocere - First Do No Harm

Always choose the most gentle, most nourishing, least harmful forms of therapy.  At the very least, a practitioner should not inflict pain, reduce vitality, or cause any harm or side affects to worsen a person!

Tolle Causum – Whole Cause

Therapies must be wholistic, not reductionistic in order to have any real or lasting healing.  The vital force works in coherence with the total body, in fact with all of nature. Hence, therapies implemented with a consciousness of the whole organism and it’s environment and psychological landscape, will be more powerful than therapies directed only at a symptom.

Tolle Totum – Whole Individual

Aim to treat the entire individual not a pathological condition.  For example a naturopathic physician never treats “asthma”, only a person with asthmatic symptoms.  Treatment must always be individualized to be most effective.

Docere – Doctor as Teacher

A physician should educate patients as to the causes of illness and teach them tools for self-healing, such as nutritional and lifestyle support, so that ailments can be prevented, and future doctor visits avoided. Physicians should inform patients of all treatment options so that they can discern palliation, suppression, and real healing for themselves, but respect and support an individual’s right to choose their own path.  

Prevention

Focus on overall health, wellness and disease prevention