Melanie Gisler, DO
Dr Gisler is an Osteopathic Board Certified Family Physician and co-director of the women’s clinic at the Akasha Center. She works with women of all ages, whole families as well as individual children and men. Dr Gisler’s interest and ongoing training in anthroposophic medicine has contributed immensely to her work with chronic illnesses including cancer care.
Dr. Gisler has pursued an osteopathic career based on a driving principle that each person is his or her own entity, consisting of body, mind, soul and spirit; and that the body is capable of self-regulation, self-healing, and health maintenance. Accordingly, any compromise in health should be considered the possible result of a synthesis of linked physical, mental, and spiritual factors, for which potentially no single form of medical treatment is adequately sufficient. As such, Dr. Gisler meets the needs of each patient and develops individual patient plans incorporating diet/lifestyle, nutrition, supplements, bio-identical hormones, anthroposophic medicines including mistletoe for cancer, cranial sacral therapy, and traditional allopathic medicine.
“While Western medications have their place in the healing sciences and may be most applicable for certain conditions under certain circumstances, they are not without limits, nor should they be considered the necessary go-to option for all health concerns.” Dr Gisler shares A.T. Still’s belief that the goal of medicine should be more than simply the pursuit of disease. He said that, “To find health should be the object of the doctor.” To truly search for health, a physician must adopt a comprehensive approach to his or her patients’ total well being.
Dr Gisler received her B.S. in Biochemistry from UCLA and her Doctorate of Osteopathy at the Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences: one of the oldest osteopathic medical schools in the country. She completed her family medicine residency at UCLA, and now resides in Los Angeles with her husband and two children.
• Dr. Gisler is a member of the American Medical Association, American Osteopathic Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Physicians Association for Anthroposophic Medicine, and The Cranial Academy
What is a Doctor of Osteopathic (D.O.) Medicine?
DOs receive extra training in the musculoskeletal system—your body’s interconnected system of nerves, muscles and bones that make up two-thirds of your body mass. This training provides osteopathic physicians with better understanding of the ways that an illness or injury in one part of your body can affect another. Both DOs and MDs are fully qualified physicians licensed to prescribe medication.
Osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT) is incorporated into the training and practice of osteopathic physicians. With OMT, osteopathic physicians use their hands to diagnose illness and injury and to encourage your body’s natural tendency toward good health. By combining all other available medical options with OMT, DOs offer their patients the most comprehensive care available in medicine today.
D.O.s and M.D.s are alike in many ways:
• Applicants to both DO and MD medical colleges typically have four-year undergraduate degrees with an emphasis on scientific courses.
• Both DOs and MDs complete four years of basic medical education.
• After medical school, both DOs and MDs obtain graduate medical education through such programs as internships and residencies. This training typically lasts three to six years and prepares DOs and MDs to practice a specialty.
• Both DOs and MDs can choose to practice in any specialty area of medicine-such as pediatrics family practice, psychiatry, surgery or obstetrics.
• DOs and MDs must pass comparable examinations to obtain state licenses
• DOs and MDs both practice in fully accredited and licensed health care facilities.
• Together DOs and MDs enhance the state of health care available in America
Notes from The American Osteopathic Association
Akasha Center for Integrative Medicine, LLC. 520 Arizona Avenue, Santa Monica, CA 90401. Phone: (310) 451.8880 Fax: (310) 451.8803
Serving Santa Monica, Venice, Pacific Palisades, Brentwood, Culver City, Beverly Hills, West Los Angeles, West Hollywood, and Los Angeles.