Your health as a woman is not just about annual screenings and reproductive differences.

Anatomy is the most obvious physical difference between men and women, but our bodies actually differ right down to the cellular level.

Your Women’s Wellness clinical team at Bastyr Center for Natural Health takes those differences into consideration whether you’re in the office for a general checkup or to discuss specific health issues.

New Guidelines for Annual Checkups

For many women, their annual exam is one of the only times in the year that they actually see their doctor. After undergoing all of the necessary screenings, there may be little time to discuss their real health issues.

Our Women’s Wellness clinicians aim to reverse that trend by utilizing a whole-person model focused on really listening to you, which is even easier to do now with updated screening guidelines.

In the past, annual exams have almost always included a PAP smear and breast exam, and after age 40 a yearly mammogram. Now instead of getting a PAP smear every year, guidelines issued by the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force recommend screening every three years starting at age 21; and the American Cancer Society recently increased the recommended age for most women to start getting yearly mammograms to 45, while also decreasing the regularity to every other year beginning at age 55.

Given Bastyr Center’s average 50-minute appointment time, that potentially opens up even more opportunities to bring up the issues you want to talk about with your clinicians. Your care team’s focus on prevention also makes your Women’s Wellness visit the perfect place to talk about preventing osteoporosis, heart disease and other issues that come up as we age.

Your Health Beyond Screenings

Your Women’s Wellness Care team also can provide a holistic approach to other health issues unique to women, such as hormone changes throughout life, fertility treatments and birth control.

As the teaching clinic of Bastyr University, Bastyr Center employs licensed clinicians with diverse skill-sets and specialties in order to better teach its student clinicians and to better serve you. Some examples include:

• Xin Dong (Rosey) Ma, MD (China), LAc, whose fertility treatments have helped nearly 500 women who had been having difficulty conceiving become mothers of healthy babies.
• Laurie Cullen, ND, an expert on birth control methods who has lectured across the country and recently spoke about placing the new Liletta intrauterine system.
• Debra Brammer, ND, who has nearly 25 years experience working with women to address health and lifestyle changes and recently gave a public lecture on Managing Menopause: Or Dancing Through Puberty Backward.
• Kelly Morrow, MSN, RDN, CD, whose clinical interests include maternal and pediatric nutrition among other specialties.

Your Women’s Wellness team can also work with you to address concerns ranging from changing sleep patterns and handling stress to managing digestion and skin problems.

Whether you choose from naturopathic medicine, acupuncture and East Asian medicine, ayurvedic medicine, nutrition or counseling, each department at Bastyr Center can offer a different approach to treating these issues, while still working together in an integrated model to make sure you are getting the best treatment. 

To make a Women's Wellness appointment, go to our Make an Appointment page or call (206) 834-4100.