Location (city, state): Mount Dora, FL
Nearest major city: Orlando, Sanford, Winter Park, FL
Phone number: 352-250-7942
Bio:
There is an undercurrent of alarm about our health care system, the rise in obesity and chronic debilitating diseases, and the side effect of most prescriptive drugs, short-comings of supplements, fuzzy imaging studies and unclear serology, failed surgery and most of all the failure to cure disease. People are hungry for a level of wellness that seems all but impossible to achieve with our current practices.
Because of the Hippocratic Oath to “Do no harm,” many health care practitioners are beginning to change the way they practice medicine. One of these is nurse practitioner Susan Hartsfield. During 30 years of hospital and emergency medical experience, Susan watched the system fail and patients rarely regain total health. So she left the hospital environment to spend 5 years in private homes promoting screening exams, tests, consults, vaccinations and other Medicare billable procedures her employer sold. None of these addressed the underlying disease — another real eye-opener.
She began to realize that the ER represented the end result of bad choices, excesses or omissions and that the problems really began in the home. Physicians and practitioners seem happy to prescribe medication for whatever bothers you. Why? Because it’s all about money. There are at least five industries that will benefit from a sick population: the pharmaceutical industry, the supplement industry, the processed food industry, the meat and dairy industry, and finally the medical community including hospitals and practitioners.
Something else derailed Susan from typical western traditions. While working full time during the week, Susan spent weekends growing her small environmental business and promoting her book, The Complete Guide to Energy Conservation for Smarties. Through her research, she became aware of the number one polluting substance in the USA was: the agriculture industry, particularly cattle. Feeling the need to be a part of the solution to pollution, Susan gave up eating all meat and dairy. Here her health care career merged with her passion for the environment. She realized if she could get folks to eat a healthy diet, she would be helping to stop the assault on our land, water and air. So she did what she always does when curious about solving problems – she returned to school.
At the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, a certificate program from New York University, Susan started her quest to provide truthful healthcare information that made a difference. Then she took a weeklong Holistic Holiday Immersion program on health and wellness that blossomed into a three-year study. After that, she attended e-Cornell University for a certificate program on Plant Based Nutrition with well-known scientist Dr. Colin Campbell. Now Susan has found other like-minded practitioners with proven scientific medical research at the Wellness Forum Health Institute. This is a center for lay people and practitioners who want to be informed and to find a direction back to health leaving their illness and chronic diseases as a thing of the past.
Coupling this education with her experience at top rated medical centers in Miami, Baltimore, and Washington DC, and the National Institutes of Health, she has gained confidence and obtained science based information about health. With evidence she can help you make informed medical decisions while offering skills for adopting and maintaining optimal health habits. You can create a Health-Styled Life with lifestyle management.
Reason for becoming a Certified Food Over Medicine Instructor:
After 30+ years in the health care industry in many capacities from the emergency department to hospitalist and finally to home visits I saw the hopelessness of medicines for chronic illnesses. After just a few short years of studying the effects of nutrition and diet, it was clear that a whole food plant based diet gave people long term success, regression of illness, best health ever and true loss of medicines and weight. It became clear that this was the road to health. As a nurse practitioner and an advocate of health I have now decided to turn the remainder of my career to spread this information to anyone willing to improve their health.