Business Profile
A New Perspective on Health By Kara Navolio
T
he Medical Institute of Healthy Aging (MIHA), led by Dr. Paul Kim, takes a unique perspective on the role of physicians and traditional medicine. Rather than focus on diagnosis and management of disease, which has been the focus of most disciplines in medicine, MIHA focuses on being proactive in identiftying possible “pre-disease”states. By being more proactive in its approach, MIHA can address the chronic diseases of aging like heart blockage, stroke, cancer, Alzheimer’s and arthritis possibly before it becomes more advanced. By monitoring patients’ health status, doctors at MIHA can be personalized, precise and preventative rather than reactive, giving each client more holistic care. MIHA opened in 2007, originally in Pleasant Hill as Previ Medical Group, Inc. It was the first of its kind clinic in the East Bay. In 2011, Previ moved to Walnut Creek. Then in 2019 the name was changed to its current Medical Institute of Healthy Aging, and they moved to a new state-of-the-art space in
Walnut Creek. It’s the first clinic to practice Valengerontology. Valen comes from the Latin word meaning strong and healthy. Gerontology is the study of aging. Thus Valengerontology is the practice of strong and healthy aging, “the best and truest form of Primary Care Medicine,” says Dr. Kim. MIHA was brought to this line of medicine by Dr. Kim’s patients who wanted a more proactive approach to their healthy. In fact, his patients are his biggest inspiration. “For example,” states Dr. Kim, “one of my elderly clients brought to my attention a new therapy for aging involving using the plasma of younger individuals to help heal certain aspects of aging.” A strong inspiration in Dr. Kim’s desire to improve healthcare is his family and his parents. His mother and father both emigrated from Korea and managed to practice medicine in the U.S. at a time when there were very few foreign M.D.s. Dr. Kim, his wife, Melanie Lee MD and their two children, Amelie and Max live in Danville. In his free time he enjoys staying active with golf and soccer. Dr. Kim adds, “What I am most proud of in my business is the accomplishment of helping my clients in a new way to achieve health goals that are outside of the disease focus of the present day system and to aid in the understanding that aging itself can be explored as a way to improve health and thereby longevity. It is a philosophy and movement that I am proud of moving into mainstream medicine. The continued motion of new ideas and findings and potential treatments, to not only slow aging but even reverse it to some degree, is on the horizon.” To learn more about this new approach to health visit www. medicalinstituteofhealthyaging.com.
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