Student Spotlight: Dr Soni Shrestha

What inspired you to study Nutrition & Health Coaching?

Being a doctor, you sometimes think, can I do more than just giving a prescription? Especially as a GP, it took time to understand that not every illness can be cured by medicine, and when you don’t have an answer, there’s a bit of frustration. I think every doctor wants to do their best, wants to go beyond and help their patients. On top of that, there was also a personal journey, slightly later on, where I came to realise there’s a lot beyond medicine that could help.

Especially when giving antibiotics and things like that, of course that will stop the infection, but the body itself has to heal eventually. All of our lifestyle, in terms of healthy diet, in terms of how we heal physically and mentally, that’s what actually helps us get back to ourselves. Before doing the nutritional coaching, I did lifestyle medicine, where I learned more and wanted to do more specifically on nutrition. That’s how I ended up finding IINH, and I found the whole team was very helpful.

Where have you used your coaching skills within your practice?

I think nowadays, thanks to social media and things like that, people understand the value of nutritional support and diet more. When I bring this into my consultations, especially when a patient tells me, “this is my diet, what can I do apart from medicine,” and they feel they’ve been heard, that there’s someone who understands nutrition a bit more and can help through nutrition, that makes my consultation even better. Also, as a trainer, I bring this into our teaching, showing that we don’t always have to rush to give medicine, there’s a lot you can do.

Medicine comes with side effects, and when it’s necessary, yes, it’s needed, but on top of that, we can still use our skills and knowledge about nutrition. I also run a cholesterol group workshop for my network in general practice, where the most common question is, “we’re taking medication, but our cholesterol still isn’t coming down, what can we do?” They feel stuck. When you bring in your nutritional coaching skills and your understanding of nutrition, people feel motivated, like they can do a lot to help themselves, and that’s where I feel the most job satisfaction.

When people understand that they can do a lot of things to help themselves, and even better, they feel like “I can help myself as well,” that’s the satisfaction, seeing that on their face. Then when they say, “this is the first time I’ve had this conversation, the first time I felt the doctor understood,” it really feels good.

How has this experience changed how you view the wider healthcare system?

It’s changed a lot, especially in medicine. As doctors, we’re not always taught nutrition or lifestyle in medical school. I think people have a lot more insight nowadays into what we should perhaps be doing differently. Although we don’t have those skills when we graduate, when you graduate, you’re proudly a doctor, but our understanding is largely how to treat the disease, how to treat the illness. I can see a lot of doctors gaining insight and coming forward to explore functional and lifestyle medicine and nutrition, and understanding its value, especially in the current state where chronic illness is at pandemic levels, where medication may not always be the only solution. I think there’s a lot we should be doing to deal with what we call the root cause, and that’s where lifestyle medicine and nutrition play a significant role.

How did you balance studying with everything else?

First of all, I found the whole team very helpful. Even though I’m not sure how I came across IINH, when you come across something new, you don’t know whether it’s the right thing for you, because you’re investing your time, effort and money. I managed to reach out to one of the team, I think it was Kami, and she reached out directly. We had several phone conversations and messages, and support around what they do and how it actually helps. That helped reassure me that this was something I wanted to do. The whole course being online learning helped a lot, because on top of my normal daily work, I’m also a mother of two, with my own personal things to do. What I loved was that since it’s online, you can watch your videos in your own time, you can study and do your own thing.

They do have live sessions too, which are recorded if you can’t attend. If I had a question, whenever I emailed, they were really prompt getting back to me. I even spoke with Richard, Director of IINH, personally, when he was helping me figure out how to expand my skills beyond my day-to-day practice. I have to say, the team is really good.

Passion is one thing, because for me, if something comes up about nutrition or lifestyle, I can talk about it all day, I can read about it all day, so it doesn’t matter. It’s a joy, even with full-time work, I don’t see it as a pressure, I just enjoy the whole learning process. Even the case studies, the recorded videos, it’s all something you can implement into your own daily practice, isn’t it, things like healthy eating? All that little advice is genuinely useful. So yeah, I enjoyed the whole process.

What would you say to someone considering studying with IINH?

I’d say if you really enjoy the idea of enhancing or improving your own health, and helping others achieve the same, then this is the right course. If someone’s worried about how they’ll manage the time, I’d say it’s online study, and you can still manage it in your own time. The whole team is helpful, so if you’re not quite sure, you can always ask them before you enrol, which is the support I had. So yeah, as I said, I can talk all day.

If you would like to reach out to Dr. Shrestha, you can find her on the below links: