Dr. Dawn Lamb discusses a homeopathic remedy for fear in her office on Monday afternoon in Chehalis.
Dr. Dawn Lamb discusses a homeopathic remedy for fear in her office on Monday afternoon in Chehalis.
Dr. Dawn Lamb discusses how she would treat a patient who showed signs of anxiety in her office on Monday afternoon in Chehalis.
Dr. Dawn Lamb, ND has a homeopathic remedy for fear. In fact, as a naturopathic physician, she knows remedies for a plethora of problems.
“The reality is most people are anxious, or most people are stressed,” Lamb said. “When I start talking, I think what happens is they realize that I’m just another person. So, let’s get better. And in that process, things happen. People just let go of their guard long enough to give me an in, give me that space to say ‘you just started crying, let’s let it go.’”
Naturopathic medicine emphasizes prevention and treatment. It encourages individuals’ inherent self-healing process, according to the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians. The practice combines traditional treatments with modern science.
Lamb is now the second naturopathic physician at Chehalis Naturopathic Medicine. Owner Kim Wilson said demand has grown for naturopathic physicians. While she employs two, there are a total of five in Lewis County.
“Our first doctor is just so crazy busy,” Wilson said. “There was just this intense demand in the community for people that knew about some of the alternative options and weren’t just allopathically minded, strictly. Dr. Free is booked out months in advance.”
Wilson said Dr. Kimberly Free, ND has expertise in cannabinoid medicine and sees a lot of veterans and children. Lamb specializes in women’s health and integrated medicine.
“Dr. Lamb comes from a whole different background,” Wilson said. “... Women’s health is a big specialty area. I’ve just been excited because I’m an acupuncturist here and seeing a lot of my patients see Dr. Lamb — and feeling really happy with the results they’re getting and there’s hope with some of these conditions they have been struggling with — has been really exciting. She is really clicking with people quickly.”
When patients enter Lamb’s office, they see a chair with purple fabric and bottles upon bottles of what look like essential oils, but have more technical names. While Lamb can prescribe traditional medicine, she avoids it.
“That’s the last thing I want to do,” Lamb said. “If they are not in acute, acute pain — and I don’t have to refer them to urgent care or the ER — I can help them get better pretty rapidly with what I have in my own arsenal of experience.”
Instead, she spends roughly an hour and a half with each patient, getting to know more about them.
“I understand that healing is more than just ‘okay, you have this disease and I’m going to give you a drug that will take care of that,’ ” Lamb said. “The reality is it doesn’t work that way. If you truly want to heal, you have to get down into the stuff you don’t want to get into.”
Lamb works with herbs and homeopathy, which is an alternative medicine that treats diseases by using small doses of a natural substance. She acknowledged that not everyone believes this type of care is beneficial, but said those aren’t the people she treats.
“Everybody has their own opinion and I’m okay with that,” Lamb said. “I figure when people show up, it’s because they’re supposed to be there. I’m not making them show up. I always tell them it’s going to be a longer road than you realize and more difficult than you realize.”
Lamb said that when people pursue a career in naturopathy, they have to be ready to change their own bad habits.
“You have to work your own self and a lot of people who are in the healthcare field, they’re not doing that,” Lamb said. “They are prescribing a drug or an herb for a symptom.”
Additionally, Lamb expects patients to work on their own bad habits. Sometimes, she said, people don’t appreciate the more difficult route to health.
“That’s the road as a naturopathic doctor and the road you have to balance,” Lamb said. “You can have a lot of patients if you’re a naturopathic doctor that acts like a medical doctor. … but most of the time when you come in, you get an hour and a half interview interaction with the naturopathic doctor. … You’re going to get such a thorough intake that this doctor will know what they will adjust first, second and third.”
