If you’re a nurse or nurse practitioner searching for a functional medicine certification program, you’re not alone. More and more RNs and NPs are seeking meaningful ways to deliver root-cause, whole-person care - and functional medicine speaks directly to that calling. But as the number of programs offering a “certification” grows, so does the confusion about what those credentials actually mean. And I'm getting a ton of questions on this subject, so...... Let’s clear things

Functional nursing isn’t a trend. It’s a professional transformation —and it’s already happening. If you’ve ever wondered what it really  looks like to integrate functional medicine into nursing practice, you're not alone. One of the most common questions I get from nurses is: “What can I actually do  with this training?” The answer? A lot more than you might think. At this point, I have trained over a thousand nurses and nurse practitioners who are now weaving functional med

If you’re an RN or NP who completed the Functional Medicine for Nurses™  course through the Integrative Nurse Coach Academy (INCA), you’ve likely heard the news: the program is coming to a close at the end of this current cohort. And if you’re anything like the many students I have heard from recently—you’re probably asking: “Now what?” “Is there a next step?” “How do I keep growing in this specialty I love?” You’re not alone. The truth is, functional medicine for nurses has

In my recent blog,   Are Labs Within a Nurse’s Scope of Practice? Let’s Reframe the Conversation ,  we explored one of the most common roadblocks nurses face when transitioning into holistic or functional practice: lab testing. The feedback I received afterward was overwhelming—and familiar. “I want my patients to have access to labs, but I’m terrified of crossing scope boundaries." “My patients are asking for testing, but I don’t have a safe way to support them.” “I feel stu

Functional Medicine’s Promise—and Its Problem Functional medicine has changed the way many of us think about health. It’s upstream, it’s root-cause, and it finally acknowledges what we as nurses have known all along: healing is about the whole person, not just a disease code. Patients leave functional medicine offices feeling heard in ways they never have before. They finally have a provider asking about their sleep, their stress, their nutrition, their story. But here’s the

What Most People Still Get Wrong About Nurses I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how often people misunderstand what nurses actually do. It’s something I hear constantly—people assuming nurses “can’t diagnose and treat” or that we’re “not supposed to make decisions, rather follow orders” in patient care. And if I’m being honest, it’s something that really frustrates me. Because I know the truth. And I’ve read enough nursing scope papers at this point—about one thousand of

by Brigitte Sager, DNP When I first started teaching functional medicine to nurses years ago, I was incredibly cautious when it came to lab work. My recommendation back then? Focus on the intake. Patient-reported symptoms. Existing lab results, if available. And then—encourage the patient to request updated and expanded labs from their primary care provider. It felt like the safest route. After all, scope of practice is no small thing. We must protect our licensure, our train

Recently, I hosted a webinar in the Nutrition for Nurses  course focused on the vagus nerve and its role in digestion—and it sparked some powerful reflections. Specifically, it reminded me just how underutilized heart rate variability (HRV)  is in nursing practice. If you’ve never explored HRV before, you’re not alone. Most of us were never taught about it in nursing school. But I believe that HRV is one of the most valuable, accessible metrics we can use to better understand

We’re standing at the edge of a healthcare revolution—and nurses are the ones holding the blueprint. For too long, our system has been reactive: chasing symptoms, writing prescriptions, and rushing through appointments without truly listening. And nurses? We’ve been expected to follow orders in a system that often doesn’t align with the heart of our profession. But here’s the truth: we’re not just caregivers—we’re leaders, educators, and healers. And the future of healthcare?

By Brigitte Sager, DNP When nurses first learn functional medicine, something big happens: We don’t just see our patients  differently—we start seeing everyone  differently. We think about our kids’ nutrition, our partner’s stress levels, our best friend’s hormone symptoms. We wonder why our parents were never told about gut health or blood sugar or the impact of inflammation. We want everyone in our circle to experience the kind of healing we just discovered. And it’s not co

A Conversation That Hit Deeper Than Expected Last month, during one of our Functional Nursing Membership MeetUps, I sat down with the intention of leading a discussion on how stress and trauma impact our patients. But as I mentally prepared for leading the discussion, something shifted. Instead of staying purely clinical, the topic and conversation became deeply personal. We found ourselves opening up about what it really means to practice as a nurse—the unseen burdens we car

Let’s Clear the Air If you’re a nurse who has ever asked, “Is functional medicine even evidence-based?” you’re not alone—and you’re not wrong to ask. Nurses are trained to think critically, assess data, and practice based on proven interventions. So when we hear terms like "root cause" or "functional approach," it’s completely fair to wonder: Is this grounded in real science or just another wellness trend? Here’s the short answer: Yes, functional medicine is absolutely eviden