What is a Lifestyle Medicine Intensivist?

A lifestyle medicine intensivist is a level of certification designed for physicians who demonstrate the advanced skills and knowledge to practice intensive therapeutic lifestyle treatment with the clinical goal of reversing disease and restoring optimal health. Core clinical competencies were published in the American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine in August 2023.

The growing field of evidence-based lifestyle medicine includes the implementation of both therapeutic and intensive therapeutic lifestyle change. While therapeutic lifestyle change treatment generally features lower dosing and more gradual shifts in behavior, intensive therapeutic lifestyle change is more immersive and uses maximum therapeutic dosing. It is closely supervised by a qualified lifestyle medicine physician who is also appropriately trained to deprescribe medications when health has improved to the point that the patient no longer needs them.

Recognition of intensive therapeutic lifestyle treatment’s potential to achieve remission, or even full reversal, in many lifestyle-related chronic diseases has grown as the United States struggles with a crisis of chronic disease.