In this episode of Functional Medicine Research, I interview Dr. Ron Parks in a discussion about COVID-19 and the mental health crises. Dr. Parks has written a new book "COVID-19 and Mental Health Crises" which we discuss as well as a variety of other topics that can help those afflicted by this pandemic.
The mental health aspects of COVID-19 are often overlooked with more of a focus on the physical aspects of the illness, medications, vaccines etc. As usual in the United States, mental health is pushed to the back of the bus with little to no dialogue or support for those who need psychological support. Dr. Parks provides a voice for those in need with his excellent new book.
Full Transcript on COVID-19 Mental Health Crises
Dr. Hedberg: Well, welcome, everyone, to Functional Medicine Research. I'm Dr. Hedberg. Very excited today to have my good friend and colleague, Dr. Ron Parks, on the show. And we're gonna be talking about his new book. And Dr. Parks is a respected physician, teacher, book author, writer, and mentor, with an integrative and holistic perspective. He especially trained in internal medicine, nutrition, preventive medicine, and board-certified in psychiatry. Currently, Dr. Parks is the medical director and psychiatrist for The Center for Spiritual Emergence and Katharos Sanctuary in Asheville, North Carolina. He has an MD from the University of Maryland and a master's degree in public health and health service research from the University of California at Los Angeles. He has completed specialty training and internal medicine at George Washington University, preventive medicine at UCLA, and psychiatry at the University of Maryland. Dr. Parks is a former assistant professor at the Albany and University of Miami Medical School, chief of internal medicine at the Homestead Air Force Base Hospital in Florida, former director of the Center for Preventive and Nutritional Healthcare in Baltimore, Maryland, and founder of the MacroHealth Medicine, a comprehensive and holistic consultative and treatment service, formerly in Asheville, North Carolina. Dr. Parks, welcome to the show.
Dr. Parks: Well, thank you, Nik. Thank you for having me.
Dr. Hedberg: Yeah. I'm looking forward to this. So, you've written a new book, it's called "COVID-19 and Mental Health Crises." So, we're gonna dig into that. But before we do that, can you just talk a little bit about how you got into integrative functional medicine and psychiatry?
Dr. Parks: Well, that's a good question. Actually, it started when I was very young. I think I write a little bit about this in the book. I came down one summer as a kid with polio. And it was very upsetting, of course. And I compared it to the current COVID crisis. Back then there was no treatment and everybody had been waiting 10 years, 8 to 10 years for a vaccine. But here I was, a young, healthy, athletic kid that suddenly was running high fevers and a stiff neck. So, I ended up in the hospital at a children's ward. And back then the only treatment they had was more of a natural treatment called the Sister Kenny treatment. It was like a heat treatment. They wrap you in warm towels. And so that was my first exposure to, you know, what I would call functional medicine or holistic medicine. Though I had a sweat through it, but luckily, I didn't end up with the paralytic form of it, but sometimes I do think I have some of the long...they're talking about with a new virus, the long hauler syndrome. But with polio, there were some aftermaths there, and I think maybe some of the weakness I had some time in the legs and things like that might be from that.
But anyway, that got me started on the path of interest in broader treatment programs. But a lot of it came, though, from my being formally, formally trained in internal medicine, where everything was about labels and diagnosis. And I remember in training, I got yelled at by the pathology teacher because I looked at a slide and I said, "I know what this is. It's such and such." He said, "The secret and the art is you spend time looking at that, you get the full picture, you let it sink into you before you tell me what it is." So, maybe he was seeing, you know, or trying to lead me in the right direction. But after working in more traditional medicine and you've seen my credentials, I mean, I would see some of the most rigorous formal training. I just finally decided to get out of it.
And actually, you know what, Nik? This is very, very interesting. I always keep up to date, you know, and I start my morning with doing some review of some current stuff. And I came across an article about burnout syndrome they call with COVID-19, and how that's affected many academics and professional people because it's so changed their lives, that it's caused them to relook at themselves. And this article just snapped something in my head and I realized in writing this book and in telling some personal stories in there, I missed the most important one. And guess what that was. When I was an internist, you know, like that conventional internist-type person, one day I was seeing somebody in my office and suddenly, it was like somebody kicked me in the gut. I never felt anything like that. And it doubled me over the floor. And the patient was, you know, on the table and I said, you know, much of like...I said, "Well, you'll have to excuse me." And I literally crawled out of the room and I called my associate, he used cover for me. And he said, "Oh, that doesn't sound too good, Ron." I said, "Why don't you go home and I'll cover for you?" I said, "Go home. You kidding? I'm going to the emergency room." So, he said, "Okay."
So, long story short, it turned out I had pancreatitis. And I thought everybody was thinking it was for alcohol or something, but it was from small gallstones. But I was in crisis, you know, and I had to, you know, go into surgery and everything. And while I was in that stressful crisis situation, my life changed. I did a whole evaluation. And I said, "I don't wanna be a traditional internist anymore. I want to see all the depths and breadth of things." And so from there, I thought the solution, of course, was to go into psychiatry. So, I sorted in the residency with the right intentions and, eventually, I went from there into holistic integrative medicine where I really belonged. But that crisis situation is what changed my life. And in the book, I tried to bring that across, you know, that there's a little bit of a raised stretch and a silver lining and sort of a place where, you know, crisis and tragedy can bring opportunity. I think that comes from oriental medicine. And just to end this little thing, I realize that I missed in the book one of the most important chapters, but don't worry. I'll write that as a new sequel or a blog, I don't know. I forgot that most important experience. But anyway, so that's a little bit how I ended up in holistic integrative medicine.
Dr. Hedberg: So, this book, you know, "COVID-19 and Mental Health Crises," we're obviously just over a year now into the pandemic. And obviously, there's gonna be a lot of mental health issues as a result of this. We know that social isolation increases inflammation and can cause mood issues and affects the immune system, all kinds of things. And then you compound that with, you know, losing jobs. And I know that divorce rates are, you know, increasing. And there's all kinds of these stresses going on because of the pandemic. And as usual, mental health is kind of pushed to the back of the bus, so to speak, and not a lot of people are really talking about it. I mean, there's a little bit out there on mental health and COVID-19. But what is this... How would this book, you know, benefit someone who has been really traumatized by this pandemic or has...you know, family members who have been traumatized and people like that? So, who are you looking to target with this book?
Dr. Parks: Actually, that's a very good question. And that triggers a whole lot of things in my mind. Let me just take the first thing that came to mind, and that was this is typical of the whole dimension between conventional medicine and holistic integrative medicine because a lot of people now that are having, you know, significant problems, and they're getting deeper into it. And so they will reach out to help. And so where they end up and, you know, mostly what's available is very conventional-oriented thinking and treatments so on. They'll say, "Oh, this is COVID-related. This is related to isolation," as I think you were saying. "This is related to the lack of being able to socialize or to get outside or..." But, again, they're missing the broader perspective. This person or the people who are listening, I mean, they know darn well, there are other issues that need to be looked at. For instance, there could be a marital problem going on. And in the close contains of, you know, an apartment or house, it could bring this to the forefront, it could flare. And that needs addressing. I mean, it's not diminishing the impact of COVID, but they need to address that.
There could be other issues. These people could have had prior trauma in their lives or even to the extent to what we call post-traumatic stress disorder. And that needs to be addressed. I mean, because when you have a new trauma, it just plays back on the old one, you know, because most people never really worked out those things. So, they're more susceptible. So, anybody that's going through the COVID experience, it's gonna be a much broader picture. For instance, you know, we're all interested in broader things like nutrition and all that kind of thing. And you were talking about inflammation of the brain. I mean, all these things were at work, but it's not just because of COVID. It's because of all the underlying things that haven't been addressed in the past and they've just gotten compounded. So,
