**Welcome to Our Practice**

SHORT VERSION :)

Hi, I’m Dr. Stephen Nenninger, but you can call me Steve. At 28, I headed West to study Naturopathic Medicine, battling a painful condition called ulcerative colitis that started when I was 22. It was exhausting—dozens of bathroom trips day and night. Conventional doctors offered drugs that made me sicker or surgery to remove my colon, with one even shouting I’d be dead in six months if I didn’t comply. I walked out.

Instead, I found a naturopathic doctor who believed I could heal, a first for me. Though I didn’t improve much after 18 months, I enrolled in naturopathic medical school. Despite the amazing professors and classmates, I graduated still sick. I built a thriving practice in New York, helping many with colitis and Crohn’s, yet my own health lagged. I managed symptoms with a restrictive diet—gluten-free, dairy-free, and more—but it wasn’t true health.

Then my teenage son got mononucleosis, followed by liver and pancreatic inflammation, and a devastating autoimmune diagnosis: primary biliary cholangitis. None of my usual tools worked. After a year of research, I stumbled on a study about helminths (worms) in ancient Nordic and Viking stool. These strong, vibrant people had worms—how? This led me to helminthic therapy. Within months of trying therapeutic hookworms, I felt incredible. My son’s lab results normalized after his dose, and they’ve stayed that way.

Dr. Alanna Pisani, my partner in practice, has her own story. After a decade as an occupational therapist in hospitals, she fell ill with severe mononucleosis. Doctors couldn’t help, and she ended up in the ER with swollen organs and worsening symptoms. Told to rest and sent home, she came to me. Together, we restored her health, and her hospital experience and intuition became vital to our work.

There are no guarantees, but we offer hope and a fresh approach when conventional methods fail. We’ve seen remarkable results, like my son’s recovery and my own, and we pour our hearts into every case. When it works, it’s magic. When it doesn’t, it’s tough, but we keep learning and pushing forward.

We’re here for the “chronic incurables,” the ones who’ve tried everything else. If that’s you, let’s talk.

Warmly,

Steve & Alanna

LONGER VERSION

An Introduction to Our Practice

Well ;) my name is Dr. Stephen Michael Nenninger N.M.D., aka Steve. I went out West to study Naturopathic Medicine in 1991 when I was 28 years old. Naturopathic Medicaly school was pretty hard because of how sick I was. Since 22 years old, I had a very boring, painful, torturous, annoying and embarrassing condition called ulcerative colitis. On my worst days I ended up going to the bathroom day and night dozens of times, it was exhausting.

I went to conventional doctors to try and get better at first. Their drugs made me really sick and did not help at all. Then the last conventional doctor I went to was in a fancy Park Avenue office with a mahogany dest and leather bound volumes on the wall, and told me that the only solution was to cut out my colon and put me on a life of drugs, or I would die.

Neither option sounded good to me. And I was a little brave or a little stupid. As I turned around and walked out of his office he yelled down the hall, “You’ll be dead in six months”. Well…Instead of dying or getting my colon cut out I went to a naturopathic doctor. He didn’t do very much to help me…except for one absolutley amazing thing…he believed in my ability to heal. The first doctor that did.

After 18 months of working with him and not getting much better I decided to go to naturopathic medical school. I had no money but I figured if I died it wouldn’t matter and if I didn’t the student loans would be worthwhile. It was a great experience and I can’t say enough about my amazing professors and classmates, but I still had colitis when I finished! Ugh. However I began to practice in New York and soon had a full practice. And my patients began to teach me. And I helped and cure many, many cases of colitis and Crohn’s and still was not better myself! What??!!. I was not worst and was incrementally better, but come on!

So I was in practice for 20 years. To manage my symptom, not cure mind you, just manage, I had to be gluten, egg, dairy, nightshade, salicilate, fodmap, fructose free. I could eat very little without symptoms. Does this sound like health? It did not feel like it to me. And my kids who were now in their teens seemed as reactive as I was, in spite of a very naturopathic upbringing. In short, it sucked.

But apparently the univverse was not done with me, and it got worse. My 17year old son got mononucleosis, and developed liver inflamation and pancreatic inflammation, and within a few months was diagnosed with primary biliary colangitis, a horrible autoimmune disease with a horrible prognosis. And all the tools that I had used for similary conditions either did not work or made him worse. Does this sound fun? Remember this was after 20 years of a full practice working with and curing the worse autoimmune conditions. So for a year I read everything I could. Eventually, after reading every research paper on autoimmune diseasem I stumbeled across a paper that discussed how the highest concentration of helmiths and worms in ancient stool was found in Nordic and Viking people. WHAT?

How could the people that were admired for their strength and vitality by both the persians and the Romans be riddled with draining, depleting, life sucking parasites?? It did not make sense. So this began the helminth, helminthic therapy, and practice dedication to therapeutic helminths. Within a few months of working with a researcher we had our first batch of therapeutic helminths ready for application, and I took them. Well… I felt amazing. Within a few months I gave my son a dose and within a few months his laboratory results were NORMAL for the first time in years. And they have continued normal since. Lots of amazing hookworm helminthic therapy stories…

This is in no way a standard naturopathic medical practice but I think there may be a harmonic way to practice. Even in natural and alternative approaches there are still some common practices that I am not fond of, and we have decided not to do in spite of the fact they would be profitable. Basically for me it is anything that boxes me in to a way I have to practice tomorrow if I change my mind today. That is why I have never used pre-designed programs or treatment protocols. Every case is not only different, but even the same case changes and becomes different.

Unfortunately it is the inefficient practice that is most successful in helping people a lot of times. I mean, it your friend your friend because they are most efficient in their time with you? Do you love your sweetheart, kids, family or parents because they are most efficient during their time with you. For better or worse the more you streamline your practice the more information you loose about the patient. Is 12X1 equal to 1x12? Simple answer is yes. But are 12 one day vacations the same as 1 twelve day vacation? I don’t think so.

It’s much easier to let go of ten bottles of a product you have tried then one hundered bottles of a supplement that you have custom labeled with your name for your practice and to sell to your patients.

What I think works is individualization. To try and understand exactly what a person needs to affect their health in a positive way and exactly how to give it to them in the safest and most efficient way possible.

Also, I don’t think that the conventional approach really yields great results for chronic illnesses either. Too much focus on the what works for most people most of the time does not really matter when it does not work for you and what your going through this time.

I don’t spend a lot of time criticizing modern medicine, it has advantages that we are all aware of and it also has known disadvantages. The main problem with modern pharmaceutical medicines is that they are based on a lot of science, mathematics, and averages. The problem is that the body is not based on these things. An example is that when they were first developing seats for fighter pilots they used averages to design the spacing of the instruments and not one single pilot could reach all of the controls properly. In my experience humans are the same, not only does the average medicine not work for everybody... but the average medicine doesn’t work for anybody. So we treat everyone as an individual. Because it works better.

We actually don’t do any set treatment protocols or pre-packaged or office labeled supplements. MostIy this is because if I become disappointed in a supplement I want to be able to throw it out. I was highly recommended to a supplement company and later found out they had citric acid (aka mold) in their supplements and I just had to toss out six cases of supplements in the garbage.

This would be a lot harder with 60 cases! Plus it all goes bad, etc, etc.4) Time listening to and understanding a case get’s you half way there. A true powerful medicine like hookworm therapy can take it rest of the way. Sitting down and understanding the story of the person and the condition, I have 30 years of practice, with thousands of people, and that is the only thing that works in my opinion.