Your Doctor Doesn’t Have Time for You

Why Your Doctor Doesn’t Have Time for You, And
How Functional Medicine Coaching Can Fill the Gap

If you’ve struggled to get an appointment with a doctor, waited months for a visit, and then been rushed through a five-minute consultation, you’re not alone. According to the January/February 2025 issue of AARP (Vol. 66, No. 1), the United States is facing an alarming physician shortage. The article, Where Have All the Doctors Gone? Finding a Physician Is Harder Than Ever, highlights a troubling reality: doctors are overbooked, overwhelmed, and often unable to provide the personalized care you deserve.

But what if you didn’t have to depend entirely on a traditional doctor for your health? What if there was another way to receive in-depth, comprehensive support for your well-being? That’s where functional medicine coaching comes in.

The Doctor Shortage:
Why You Can’t Get the Care You Need

The AARP article outlines several reasons why seeing a physician has become increasingly difficult:

• Fewer Primary Care Doctors – More doctors are specializing in high-paying fields, leaving fewer general practitioners available.

• Increased Patient Load – The demand for healthcare is rising, especially as the population ages, but the number of practicing physicians isn’t keeping up.

• Short Appointment Times – Physicians often see 20-30 patients a day, meaning each patient gets only a few minutes of attention.

• Long Wait Times – Patients often wait months for an appointment, especially for specialists, leaving many people with undiagnosed or poorly managed conditions.

The bottom line? Your doctor doesn’t have time for you—not because they don’t care, but because the system is failing both patients and providers.

The For-Profit Takeover:
How Corporate Medicine Is Making Healthcare Worse

One of the biggest contributors to declining healthcare quality is the growing trend of for-profit healthcare firms acquiring private practices. In the past, many doctors operated independent or small-group practices, allowing them to prioritize patient care over profits. However, large corporate entities have been buying up these practices at an alarming rate, turning them into profit-driven enterprises rather than patient-centered healthcare providers.

These corporations prioritize profit margins over patient outcomes, meaning:

• Doctors are pressured to see more patients in less time, reducing visit lengths to as little as 5-10 minutes.

• Unnecessary tests and procedures are encouraged to boost revenue, rather than focusing on prevention and root-cause medicine.

• Necessary test and procedures are being denied to save costs, increasing profitability for shareholders.

• Insurance companies dictate care—rather than your doctor—limiting what tests, treatments, and therapies can be offered based on profit motives rather than patient needs.

As a result, doctors working under these corporate healthcare giants are deeply frustrated. Many feel unable to provide quality care because they are forced to follow protocols that maximize financial gain rather than patient health. Physicians who entered medicine with a passion for helping people often find themselves burned out, disillusioned, and even leaving the profession altogether. This has only worsened the doctor shortage, as many dedicated physicians refuse to work under these restrictive, high-pressure conditions.

A 2023 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that physician burnout rates have reached an all-time high, with nearly 63% of doctors experiencing symptoms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and dissatisfaction with their work. The primary cause? Corporate control over medical decision-making, forcing doctors to prioritize profit over patients.

 

The Functional Medicine Coaching Difference:
A Personalized Approach to Health

Unlike conventional medicine, which often treats symptoms rather than the root cause of illness, functional medicine takes a whole-body approach to wellness. It’s about looking “upstream” to identify what’s causing your symptoms, rather than just prescribing a medication to manage them.

At Intentional Wellness, Shannon, a certified functional medicine health coach, has taken the same advanced courses that medical doctors (MDs) study to become functional medicine practitioners. While she cannot prescribe or take you off medications, she can guide you toward lifestyle changes that can significantly improve your health—often reducing your need for medication altogether.

What You Will Get with a Functional Medicine Coach
That You Won’t Get from a Doctor

The biggest difference between seeing a general practitioner and working with a functional medicine coach is time and depth of care.

With a doctor:

• You wait months for an appointment.

• Your visit lasts 5-10 minutes (if you’re lucky).

• You often leave with a prescription, but little understanding of why you’re sick or what you can do to improve your health naturally.

With Shannon as your functional medicine health coach at Intentional Wellness:

• You get hours of dedicated time to focus on your health each month.

• We create a personalized health plan tailored to your body, history, and lifestyle.

• We look at diet, sleep, stress, gut health, environmental toxins, and genetics to uncover the true root cause of your symptoms.

• I use natural strategies to help your body heal itself—without relying on medications unless absolutely necessary.

 

Good Health: Your Best Defense
Against the Doctor Shortage

With fewer doctors available, one of the best ways to protect yourself is to stay as healthy as possible—so you don’t need to see a doctor as often. Functional medicine coaching helps you build resilience, prevent disease, and optimize your well-being, so you’re not stuck waiting months for a rushed doctor’s visit that leaves you feeling unheard and unresolved.

At Intentional Wellness, we work together to get your health on track and keep it there. Whether you’re struggling with chronic fatigue, inflammation, hormone imbalances, digestive issues, or just want to feel better overall, functional medicine can help you reclaim your health and independence from the overwhelmed medical system.

 

Take Control of Your Health Today

If you’re tired of waiting for appointments, feeling dismissed in short doctor visits, or relying on medications that don’t solve the root cause of your issues, functional medicine coaching is the solution you’ve been searching for.

Let’s take back control of your health—together. Schedule a consultation with Shannon at Intentional Wellness today and start your journey toward better health, fewer medications, and a life free from the limitations of our broken healthcare system.