What if your most powerful clinical tool is not another lab panel but the way you partner with patients around what their bodies already know?

Functional medicine PA Zoie Phillips joins Tracy Harrison to share how choosing integrity over a conventional career path led her to a values-based, telemedicine practice where patients act as true partners rather than passive recipients. She walks through her decision to commit to functional medicine straight out of PA school, her rocky attempt at a conventional job, and the moment she trusted her calling enough to wait for a role that actually fit. Along the way, Zoie explains how SAFM training helped her turn complex biochemistry into plain language, why education sits at the center of every visit, and how inviting patient intuition into the room often reveals clues no test would catch.

Zoie and Tracy also get honest about the slow, vulnerable early months of building a values-aligned practice, from financial reality checks and awkward networking attempts to the steady word of mouth that now fills Zoie’s schedule with patients who are ready to do the work. They talk about low stomach acid, trauma, and nervous system safety as hidden drivers of gut issues and explore why supplements alone never count as true root cause care. If you have ever wondered how to grow a functional medicine practice that honors your values, your bandwidth, and your patients’ autonomy at the same time, this conversation offers both caution signs and a hopeful, very human blueprint.

Episode Breakdown:

00:00 Functional Medicine for Real World Impact Introduction

01:38 Meet Functional Medicine PA Zoie Phillips and Upcurrent Functional Medicine

03:49 Choosing Functional Medicine Over a Conventional PA Career

11:21 Discovering a Calling and Vision for a Values-Based Practice

15:07 Turning Functional Medicine Science Into Clear Patient Education

20:43 From Paternalistic Care to True Functional Medicine Partnership

26:35 The Realities of Starting a Telemedicine Functional Medicine Practice

33:27 Money, Beliefs, and Building a Sustainable Functional Medicine Business

42:16 Building a Small but Mighty Functional Medicine Care Team

53:18 Low Stomach Acid, Trauma, and Root-Cause Gut Health

01:01:36 Letting Go of the “All-Knowing Expert” and Trusting Patient Intuition

Links

Zoie Phillips’ Functional Medicine Practice

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