Medical Care vs. Wellness Care
Medical Care vs. Wellness Care: What's the Difference and How Does Health Insurance Play a Role?
When it comes to taking care of your body, you might hear the terms medical care and wellness care thrown around. While they’re both about your health, they serve different purposes—and understanding these differences can help you make smarter choices for your well-being (and your wallet!).
What Is Medical Care?
Medical care is what you get when something’s not quite right—think injuries, illnesses, or chronic conditions. It’s the realm of doctors diagnosing and treating diseases, surgeries, prescriptions, and hospital visits. Medical care tends to be reactive: it kicks in after a problem pops up.
Examples of Medical Care:
Emergency room visits
Antibiotics for infections
Surgery to fix an injury
Managing chronic illnesses like diabetes or hypertension
What Is Wellness Care?
Wellness care is all about keeping your body and mind in tip-top shape before anything goes wrong. This is the proactive, preventative, feel-good side of health. Wellness care focuses on things like nutrition, exercise, stress management, and therapies that nurture your whole being without necessarily targeting a specific illness.
Examples of Wellness Care:
CranioSacral Therapy to reduce stress and improve nervous system balance
Naturopathic treatments to improve overall energy and a sense of ease
Yoga and meditation practices
Regular check-ups and screenings to prevent illness
Where Does Health Insurance Fit In?
Health insurance usually pays for medical care like doctor visits, hospital stays, and medicine for specific and diagnosable issues. So, if you break a bone or catch the flu, insurance helps pay for your care. Medical naturopathic care helps manage these diagnosable issues and is often covered under your alternative medicine benefits.
But wellness care, like CranioSacral Therapy and vitalistic naturopathic care, keeps you healthy before problems start, and usually isn’t covered by insurance.
Why Does This Matter?
Medical care costs can be high. Insurance helps protect you from these big expenses.
Wellness care can help reduce medical care needs. By investing in your wellness, you might avoid trips to the emergency room, lengthy treatments, and prevent chronic illnesses.
Out-of-pocket spending on wellness care is common. Since many wellness services aren’t covered, you’ll often pay directly. For some, this is totally worth it for the improvements in health and happiness.
How to Maximize Your Health Coverage
Check your benefits! Some insurance plans include wellness perks or alternative therapy coverage.
Invest wisely in wellness. Even if insurance doesn’t cover it, wellness care can pay off by keeping you healthier in the long run.
Combine the best of both worlds. Use medical care for the diagnoses you already have and wellness care to strengthen and support your health and increase your resistance to new illnesses.
At Herbs & Hands Craniosacral Therapy, Dr. Currey provides compassionate naturopathic medical care and a variety of wellness treatments, gladly accepting insurance and referrals from your primary medical provider to make supporting your medical needs easier. Whether your goal is to treat a medical condition, gently relax your nervous system, promote natural healing, or boost your energy levels, CranioSacral Therapy and Naturopathy blend beautifully with your existing care, helping you reconnect and tune into your body’s incredible natural healing abilities.
Stay playful, stay well, and remember: health is a full-spectrum adventure!
