Simone Barrance, Science and Education Manager at SFI Health — Home of Flordis —shares the importance of working with evidence-based products.
Since 2000, SFI Health has been passionate about making natural medicines more accessible for Australians who are seeking different ways to support their health. Why are natural medicines important and what should people look for?
Complementary medicines have been used for centuries across the globe and are the backbone of many of the medicines we know and use today. The World Health Organization estimates that around 80 per cent of the world’s population still use traditional medicines today, so it is important that we produce evidence-based efficacious products that support the demand worldwide. The research and evidence in complementary medicines have come a long way, and we are now able to produce complementary medicines with specific active constituent profiles that are reflected in clinical trials to ensure we are providing users with the best possible clinical outcomes. This evidence-based approach also supports the strength, reputation and acceptance of complementary medicine use alongside mainstream medicines to provide a more holistic, patient-centred approach to health care.
Please share your “source-to-patient” philosophy and why that’s important.
When it comes to plant-based medicines, the quality and consistency can vary greatly from batch to batch, as there are many important factors that go into this, such as where the plant is grown, the soils and climate, when and how it was harvested and how it is processed. Our source-to-patient philosophy is a multistep process that ensures that the correct species of plants are grown in a suitable environment, nurtured and harvested at the correct time using the most appropriate methods and then processed in state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities to ensure batch-to-batch consistency. We pride ourselves on this strict quality control, as this then allows us to use extract-specific plant-based medicines in which we have finished product research, supporting clinical outcomes.
This is similar when it comes to ingredients such as probiotics, as it is important to use strain-specific probiotics and doses used in clinical trials to replicate the positive results seen in the trials.
SFI Health medicines are healthcare-practitioner only. How does SFI Health engage and work with healthcare practitioners?
As our products are evidence-based, we ensure healthcare professionals are able explore the clinical research to better understand how our products can benefit their patients. Understanding the clinical research is vital, and we provide a wealth of different clinical resources and materials for healthcare professionals and final year students through our HCP portal on our website. This dedicated area provides clinical reference materials, research overviews and prescribing guides to support healthcare professional recommendation and clinical use of our products. It is also a wonderful area for further education, as this is where we host our renowned webinars in which we have key opinion leaders in specific fields across the globe sharing their insights and clinical use of our products. It is also a resource for final year students, as they too can be granted access to the healthcare professional-only area.
Please talk to us about the important role healthcare professionals face in identifying and understanding which evidence-based products are right for their patients.
Healthcare professionals have an important role in supporting a patient’s health journey, and often rely on evidence-based complementary medicines that are supported by research, are well tolerated and are manufactured under strict quality control. It can be quite hard to differentiate between products at first glance, and this is where the evidence from clinical trials and extract or strain specificity really are the advantage and support a healthcare professional’s decision-making, as we understand that research can not be transferred across different extracts of the same herbs as there may be differences within the constituents and quality and therefore patient outcomes.
It feels great to work for a company that is de
Dedicated to providing a select range of clinically researched integrative medicines, SFI Health empowers people to achieve and maintain health naturally. You’re doing good, for so many. How does that make you feel?
dicated to supporting the growth, production and recommendation of quality, efficacious complementary medicines globally, setting the benchmark within the industry. The clinical research and the clinical materials that support our products really reinforce how we are making a difference in people’s lives, and I enjoy the opportunity to work with and educate healthcare professionals on the latest research so that they can better help their patients.
What’s next for SFI Health?
We are continuing to develop further healthcare professional education to continue to lead with science and education as well as continuing to strengthen our three key pillars of the business, in particular our microbiome category.
Connect with SFI Health — Home of Flordis today.
W: flordis.com.au
