Melinda Ring,MD, FACP, ABOIM, CNS
Integrative Physician
Nutritionologist
Speaker, Author
Teacher, Innovator
My mission is to transform healthcare to focus on health and wellbeing over disease.I help individual patients, communities, and businesses conceptualize how to achieve meaningful change through education and empowerment.Photo credit: Abigail Zoe Martin
Some of the topics I'm most passionate about in integrative health:🍅 Teaching Topics: Culinary Medicine, Integrative Medicine, Women’s Health, Leadership Training.🥕 Clinical Expertise: integrative women’s health from perimenopause to PCOS, bioidentical hormones, thyroid and adrenal, nutrition, plant-based diets, natural products, mindbody approaches, functional medicine.
🍋 Advocacy: raising awareness of whole-person care with the end-goal of ultimately influencing healthcare policy and practice.🥒 Awareness: writing Op-Eds, articles and books; speaking, and hosting education events.
© MelindaRingMD. All rights reserved.
Work
I've served as Executive Director of the Osher Center for Integrative Health at Northwestern University since 2007. We have amazing researchers, clinicians, educators and administrators as part of our Northwestern team. Our faculty also collaborates with colleagues from eight esteemed programs around the globe as part of the Osher Collaborative.My teaching is all around integrative and culinary medicine, and leadership development. I founded a novel culinary medicine training Cooking Up Health with our partner, the non-profit organization Common Threads. This class teaches future doctors about food as medicine by actually getting them into the kitchen. I co-direct a national fellowship to train the next generation of clinicians to practice integrative medicine. I am also core faculty for the Duke Leadership in Health and Wellbeing where up-and-coming leaders are nurtured.My research has focused on food as medicine, as well as integrative modalities such as acupuncture and contemplative medicine interventions.To foster awareness about whole-person integrative and functional medicine I lecture to scientific and lay audiences about a broad range of health topics, write books, articles and op-eds, and most recently was invited to speak at TEDxChicago 2021, titled How to Be Your Own First, Best Doctor.As part of my advocacy for the field, I serve as vice-chair of the board of the American Board of Integrative Medicine (the exam that certifies qualified physicians) and have been active in leadership roles in the Academic Consortium for Integrative Medicine and Health (the national academic organization).
Sampling of some of my recent work:SPEAKING
🍠 Academic e.g. keynote and invited speaker for international conferences, grand rounds
🧄 Professional audiences e.g. WPO, YPO, Global Wellness Summit
🌶️ Media/public e.g. TEDxChicago, CBS, Fox, PBS, Well+Good, O Magazine, PreventionPUBLICATIONS
OpEds:
🍊 More city green space can mean less city violence. Chicago Sun-Times
🥗 Want to Prevent Thousands of Deaths a Year? Make Doctors and Nurses Meditate. Washington Post
🌰 As Both Patients and Physicians, Women Face Discrimination. KevinMD.com
🍵 I’m Called Anti-Science. I’m Just an Early Adopter. doximity.comBooks
🍑 Natural Approaches to Menopause. Rodale Inc.
🫒 Integrative Medicine and Primary Care. Primary Care - Clinics in Office Practice, Elsevier.Scientific Articles/Abstracts
🍅 Cooking Up Health: A Novel Culinary Medicine and Service Learning Elective for Health Professional Students
🥕 Examining the Effects of Popular Diet Intervention (Juice Cleanses) on Epigenetics.
🍋 Acupuncture History, Expectations, and Postoperative Experience Among Cardiac Surgery Patients: The ACU-Heart Pilot Trial.
🥦 Development of a New Clinical Mindfulness Research Tool "iM-HERE" to Enhance Online Mindfulness Interventions.
🫐 Core Competencies for Integrative Medicine Fellowship Training Programs.
🍇 The Medical Student Stress Scale: Development of a New Measure of Medical Student Stress Using Modern Measurement Theory Applications.
🧅 Cannabidiol Use by Integrative Medicine Clinic and Cannabis Dispensary Clients in San Francisco, San Diego, and Chicago
About
I'm live with my family in Hyde Park, Chicago. I'm so proud of my 2 grown boys, Josh and Matt, and am at peace when reading by the fire with my soul partner, Michael. For fun I love to go dancing with friends, read fairy tale fiction, Peloton, cook plant-based meals, make herbal remedies and express my creativity through knitting and art projects.In 2021 we lost both our dogs, so until we bring some new puppy love into our home I'm getting my animal love through feeding our backyard squirrels and birds.Here's some basic resume facts:
EDUCATION
🥭 University of Chicago: Medical School, Internal Medicine Residency
🍏 Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine: Fellowship in Integrative MedicineAWARDS
🍅 100 Women of Influence, Today's Chicago Woman
🥕 Most Compassionate Doctor, Vitals
🍋 Drs. Carl and Pat Greer Distinguished Physician in Integrative Medicine
🥦 Patients’ Choice Award from Vitals
🫐 ARCC Community-Engaged Research Partnership Award
🍇 Feinberg Academy of Medical Educators
🧅 Bravewell Distinguished Service Award, Academic Consortium of Integrative Medicine & Health
Contact
Please reach out if interested in working with me for conferences, podcasts, media interviews,consultancy roles, and commissioned writing and speaking.Topic examples:
🍎 You Can Be Your Best, First Doctor
🥬 Culinary Medicine: Anytime, Anyplace
🥑 Nutritionology: The New Science of Food that Heals
🍒 Surprising Trends in Women's HealthFor patient care inquiries, please see the Northwestern Medicine Osher Clinic Site. Physician referrals required.
Thank you
Thank you for stopping by!
Please follow me on Instagram and Twitter @MelindaRingMD for health tips and updates on opportunities to learn how to be your own first, best doctor.