If you are like me, those resolutions you made for a new year are just starting to fade away. Some of them already may have collapsed. Or maybe all you need is some encouragement and motivation. This issue of Wellspring aims to do just that.

Of all of the vows made at the start of a new year, my guess is that 95 percent or more accept the adage that proclaims we are what we eat. To be sure, what we put into our bodies has the greatest impact on our daily health, our ability to heal and our capacity to prevent chronic illness.

At NorthBay Healthcare, we practice some of the most advanced medicine available, certainly in Solano County, and in some cases, beyond. Some of what we do is not “health” care, but “illness” care. But for more than a decade we have been building up the services devoted to preventive and restorative health.

A great example is a service we call “Functional Medicine,” a focus on six areas that can lead to an optimal life: medical nutrition, environmental detoxification, hormonal optimization, sleep, exercise and the mind-body connection. It’s not traditional Marcus Welby doctoring and it’s not the magic pill either. It’s just another tool.

In recent years, we’ve also worked on emotional and psychological health for our patients, understanding that a healthy mind can lead to a healthy body. In this issue you can see how to add this tool to build a better life for yourself.

How and what you eat, how well you sleep, what exercise you choose, where you shop for food, how you manage your diet and any medications—all great topics that we do not address often enough, and all things that could help you make New Year’s resolutions your life-changing routine.

Aristotle is credited with advocating moderation in all things. So again, if you are like me, there’s probably a hot dog and a Mountain Dew that slip into the menu once in a while. That’s OK, as long as it’s not the slippery slope that propels a descent into nutritional purgatory. Who knows, maybe in time I’ll lose my soft spot for a soft drink and frankfurter. It would cut down on the amount of time I spend on the treadmill every morning.

Enjoy this issue of our magazine. And good luck with those resolutions.

Gary Passama

President and Chief Executive Officer