Nurse Practitioners (NPs) are advanced practice healthcare providers with graduate-level education and extensive clinical training. In states such as Colorado and New Mexico, qualified Nurse Practitioners have full practice authority, allowing them to evaluate, diagnose, and treat patients independently.
NPs can perform physical examinations, diagnose acute and chronic conditions, prescribe medications, order and interpret laboratory testing, and order advanced diagnostic studies such as MRI and CT scans and cardiovascular imaging. When specialized care is needed, Nurse Practitioners collaborate and co-manage care with physicians and other specialists to help ensure patients receive appropriate, coordinated care.
Functional Medicine Nurse Practitioners bring an additional perspective to patient care. Along with diagnosing and treating illness, they look more deeply at the factors that may be contributing to a patient’s symptoms or chronic health concerns. This may include evaluating nutrition, metabolism, gastrointestinal health, hormones, inflammation, lifestyle, environmental exposures, and other underlying contributors. The goal is not simply to manage symptoms, but to identify and address potential root causes and support long-term health.
Shirley Olson, NP-C, FMCP-C, is a board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner with additional advanced training and certification in Functional Medicine through the Institute for Functional Medicine. She combines conventional medical evaluation and treatment with a personalized, root-cause approach to help patients better understand and address the factors affecting their health.