Functional Medicine Melbourne
If you are in Melbourne and have spent years being told your tests are normal while you still feel unwell, you are the person we built this practice for.
How we work with Melbourne patients
Functional medicine for
Melbourne, by telehealth.
If you are in Melbourne and have spent years being told your tests are normal while you still feel unwell, you are the person we built this practice for. Advanced Functional Medicine works with people across Melbourne and greater Victoria who are dealing with complex, long-running health problems that conventional care has not resolved. We consult by telehealth, so you work with us from home, with the same testing and the same depth of care as an in-person clinic, wherever you are in the city or the state.
We are not a quick-fix service. The people we help most are usually the ones who have already tried the most: multiple practitioners, changing diets, long supplement lists, and still no clear answers. Our work is to find what is actually driving your symptoms and address it in the right order.
Functional medicine looks for the root cause rather than managing symptoms one at a time. The body is a connected system, the gut, the hormones, the nervous system, the detox pathways all affect each other, and a symptom in one area is often driven by a problem somewhere else entirely. Our job is to map that picture properly and treat the cause. The clinic was founded by Jarrod Cooper, a naturopathic doctor and published author in the field, and built around this way of working.
Two things set the approach apart. The first is depth of testing. We use advanced functional testing that goes well beyond a standard panel, an extended blood panel of over eighty markers read against optimal rather than just normal ranges, advanced stool testing, and organic acids testing, so we can see what standard tests miss. The second is sequence. We address the body in a deliberate order, stabilising the foundations first, then the gut, then the biochemistry, then the hormones and optimisation, because the right treatment in the wrong order often does not work.
This sequenced, root-cause approach is the method every practitioner in the clinic is trained in and works to.
- Telehealth consultations Australia-wide, with no travel
- Pathology referrals you can use at any local collection centre
- A written, prioritised plan kept in your patient portal
What we help with
Complex chronic conditions, investigated properly.
We work across complex, chronic and hard-to-resolve presentations, including gut health problems such as IBS, SIBO, bloating and reflux; thyroid disorders and Hashimoto's, including cases where tests read normal but symptoms persist; autoimmune conditions; chronic fatigue with no clear cause; MTHFR and methylation issues; hormonal imbalances; mould illness and CIRS; and mental health presentations with a biochemical component.
How it works
From first consult to a plan that's yours.
The same structured process, delivered entirely online. Most Melbourne patients complete it without ever needing to travel.
Book your consultation
A 30 to 45 minute new patient consultation. We work through your timeline, symptoms, prior testing and lifestyle to build a complete picture of where things shifted.
Targeted testing
We send pathology referrals and any specialty test kits. Collect samples locally or at home - results come back to us directly.
Results & your plan
We walk you through what the testing shows and give you a written, prioritised protocol - supplements, nutrition and lifestyle, in order.
Ongoing care
Scheduled reviews keep the plan accountable to your results, with direct messaging between appointments and team review on complex cases.
Testing in Melbourne
Where Melbourne
patients get tested.
We work with the major Australian pathology networks, so standard blood work can be collected close to home. Specialty functional test kits are posted to your door.
Not near a collection centre? We post a pathology kit to your door with everything you need, then you return it by reply-paid post.
Telehealth patients get exactly the same care and access as someone who walks into our Perth clinic. Not a reduced version, the same practitioners, the same testing, the same treatment plans, the same follow-up. In fact many of our Perth patients choose telehealth anyway, simply because it is more convenient than travelling in.
Here is what that looks like in practice. Consultations run through a secure medical video link with nothing to download, joinable from your phone or computer. Pathology is handled through our electronic links with all major Australian testing labs, so you collect your samples locally and the results come straight back to you. And every patient has access to our secure online patient portal, where all your test results are stored, you can message your practitioner and our admin team directly, upload previous results for review, and order your supplements. Everything you need to manage your care is in one place. Being in Melbourne rather than Perth changes nothing about the standard of care you receive.
Reviews
What our patients say.
Rating
Why AFM
Led by Jarrod Cooper - ND, author of The Healing Hierarchy.
Jarrod founded Advanced Functional Medicine after more than a decade in clinical practice, frustrated by how often complex patients were told their results were"normal." His approach is sequential: find what's driving the dysfunction, then treat the body in the order it actually heals.
Melbourne patients work with Jarrod and the team entirely online. Behind every case is a multi-practitioner clinic, so complex presentations are reviewed across the team.
Naturopathic Doctor
-
Author, The Healing Hierarchy
-
Functional Medicine
Functional medicine in Melbourne
A common worry for Melbourne patients moving to a telehealth practice is whether they will lose easy access to testing. They will not. Melbourne and Victoria are served by an extensive pathology network, with providers such as Melbourne Pathology, Dorevitch Pathology and Australian Clinical Labs operating collection centres right across the metropolitan area and into regional Victoria. We hold electronic links with the major labs, so your practitioner lodges the requests digitally, you attend a collection centre close to home, whether that is in the inner suburbs, out through the east, the north or the west, or in regional Victoria, and your results return directly to your patient portal. The specialised functional tests that are not collected at standard centres, such as advanced stool and organic acids panels, are couriered to your door with clear instructions.
Melbourne is also a city where many people have already spent years and considerable money moving between GPs, specialists and allied health practitioners without anyone joining the dots. The value of a functional medicine approach here is that it pulls the whole picture together, looking at how the gut, hormones, nervous system and detox pathways interact, rather than treating each symptom in isolation across a scattered set of appointments. For the person who has been told repeatedly that their results are normal while they still feel unwell, that shift in approach is often what finally makes the difference.
There is a seasonal dimension worth noting too. Melbourne’s cooler, damper climate and its large stock of older housing can make indoor damp and mould a more common environmental factor than people expect, particularly through the winter months. Mould related illness and the chronic inflammatory patterns that can follow are an area we work in regularly, and for some Melbourne patients with multi-system symptoms that have resisted every other approach, the home environment turns out to be a meaningful and overlooked part of the picture.
FAQ
Questions
from Melbourne.
The things people ask most before booking. If yours isn't here, our team is happy to help.
Can I really get the same care by telehealth as in person?
How does the testing work for Melbourne patients?
What conditions do you work with?
How is functional medicine different from seeing my GP?
Do I need a referral to book?
Get started
Ready to find out what is actually driving your symptoms?
Or learn more about our advanced testing and how we work.