Whole-Person Care Coordination for Complex Chronic Illness and Self-Pay Healthcare
Complex illnesses–illnesses that affect more than one part of a person’s body and more than one domain of a person’s life–rarely fits inside one specialty, one diagnosis, or one insurance directory. They affect the nervous system, immune system, hormones, environment, relationships, finances, and sense of purpose. Complex illnesses include rare, genetic, congenital, developmental, chronic & event-triggered illnesses.
Complex illnesses affect at least 130 million Americans (after deduplication). However, the average complex patient isn’t dealing with just one category of complex illness; they’re dealing with two, three, or four simultaneously. That’s exactly why successfully navigating the U.S. care ecosystem seems near-impossible. They were built for single-condition episodes, not long-term, multi-condition experiences.
Complex illness overcomers who are successfully navigating their healing journeys are:
- Seeking self-pay or cash-pay healthcare
- Working outside insurance networks
- Exploring functional or integrative medicine
- Looking for trauma-informed therapy
- Seeking spiritual healers or faith-based counseling
- Working with relationship coaches or executive coaches
- Needing housing, financial, or community support
- Pursuing whole-person healing
- Seeking curative care–not just symptom management
- Using internet searches to self-diagnose and then find professionals who specialize in caring for people in their life stage and diagnosis
Benes Companies has developed an evidence-based approach to whole-person care that incorporates these best practices to improve complex illness health outcomes. We have combined academic research from decades of observation and analysis that shows preventive, coordinated, collaborative, curative, cross-domain care is the gold standard to curing complex illness.
Why “Clients” and “Professionals”?
Complex illness requires care coordination and collaboration across all seven domains of a person’s life. Each domain of a person’s life uses different terms to describe the consumer-producer relationship. The spiritual domain calls consumers “followers” and producers “spiritual leaders”, whereas physiological domain calls consumers “patients” and producers “providers”. However, the most common terms across all domains is “clients” and “professionals”, so this is what we will use across our platforms.
Clients
The term client reflects an active participant building a coordinated team across multiple domains of life — not a passive recipient of isolated treatment. It includes:
- Clergy congregants
- Therapist clients
- Physiological patients
- Environmental consulting clients
- Financial & legal clients
- Social work clients
- Community members
- Professional coaching clients
Professionals
The term professional reflects the full ecosystem required for healing:
- Spiritual healers and faith-based counselors
- Trauma therapists and psychologists
- Physicians and psychiatrists
- Functional and integrative medicine providers
- Acupuncturists and herbalists
- Community service organizations and case managers
- Relationship therapists and relationship coaches
- Financial advisors and estate planners
- Professional and executive coaches
Seven Life Domains
Complex illness affects more than physiology. Our care ecosystem supports all seven, interconnected life domains which are affected by complex illness:
Spiritual
Connection to a power greater than ourselves, which brings meaning, faith & connection to life
Psychological
Conscious & subconscious thoughts that flow through our nervous systems (AKA mind & heart)
Physiological
Tangible body systems including nervous system, emotional system, connective system, and all organs
Environmental
Physical surroundings including: air, water, sound, light, electromagnetic quality; food supply, personal care products, household cleaners, household goods, housing; recreation, transportation & safety
Capital
The ability to generate resources through creativity or trade; includes finances, assets, time, energy, skills, networks
Social
Relational health with family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances, community & the world
Influential
What happens after you leave: professional, generational, chronological purpose, impact & legacy
This framework allows clients to see the full landscape of support and helps professionals understand where their expertise fits within coordinated care.
Four Care Models
Different Philosophies. Different Strengths.
No single medical approach is optimal for every condition. The Care We Need supports coordination across all three major care models.
Western Care Model (AKA Western Medicine)
Western Care Model is the conventional, evidence-based system focused on diagnosing and treating disease through testing, technology, medication, and surgical intervention. It is optimal for acute illness, medical emergencies, advanced diagnostics, severe psychiatric conditions, and complex disease management.
Primary care physicians, internists, pediatricians, psychiatrists, surgeons, cardiologists, neurologists, oncologists, hospital systems, emergency medicine physicians.
Eastern Care Model (AKA Traditional Medicine)
Eastern and Traditional Medicine focuses on restoring systemic balance using long-established practices rooted in energy regulation and pattern recognition. It is optimal for chronic stress, pain syndromes, hormonal imbalance, digestive disorders, and long-term nervous system regulation.
Acupuncturists, Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners, Ayurvedic practitioners, herbalists, energy medicine practitioners.
Integrative & Complementary Care Model (AKA Integrative Medicine)
(Formerly Complementary & Alternative Medicine)
Integrative Medicine emphasizes root-cause analysis, lifestyle restructuring, and whole-person optimization, often combining conventional diagnostics with mind-body-spirit interventions. It is optimal for chronic illness, inflammatory conditions, metabolic dysfunction, and preventive health optimization. Complementary medicine includes other providers who support whole-body function.
Functional medicine physicians, naturopathic doctors, chiropractors, nutritionists, lifestyle medicine physicians, integrative psychiatrists.
Holistic Care Model (AKA Holistic Healing)
Holistic healing emphasizes caring for multiple domains of a person’s life simultaneously. It is necessary for complex illnesses because they usually affect all seven domains of a person’s life. We consider professionals who cause healing and thriving in spiritual (identity prayer, faith), capital (resources, skills, and networks), social (family, friend, and community relationships), and influential (professional, generational, chronological impact) domains to also be care professionals. See the Seven Life Domains for details.
Clergy, financial advisors, guidance counselors, professional coaches, community event organizers, educators, relationship coaches, parenting coaches.
Three Care Sectors
Different Systems That Affect Health Outcomes
The U.S. care ecosystem is comprised of three sectors that are independently operated & organically managed: healthcare, wellness, and human services. Theoretically, these sectors should be collaborating on the care provided to people navigating complex illness, but in reality, this collaboration happens at the client-level, if at all.
1 Wellness Sector
The Wellness Sector focuses on prevention, optimization, and personal development rather than disease treatment. It is optimal for stress reduction, fitness improvement, spiritual growth, relationship strengthening, leadership development, and performance enhancement.
Health coaches, fitness professionals, meditation instructors, breathwork practitioners, spiritual healers, faith-based counselors, relationship coaches, professional and executive coaches, retreat centers, wellness programs.
2 Healthcare Sector
The Healthcare Sector includes licensed clinical services that diagnose, treat, and manage illness or injury. It is optimal for medical stabilization, chronic disease monitoring, mental health treatment, and medication management.
Hospitals, medical clinics, primary care practices, specialty practices, psychologists, licensed therapists, psychiatrists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, pharmacies.
03 Human Services Sector
The Human Services Sector addresses the social and environmental conditions that directly impact health outcomes. It is optimal for housing instability, food insecurity, financial stress, disability support, transportation barriers, and community resource coordination.
Housing assistance programs, food banks, transportation services, disability support agencies, case management organizations, financial counseling services, community outreach programs, nonprofit social service agencies.
Complex Illness Healing Journey
Complex illness healing often unfolds in eight stages within a single health domain, in a spiral — not linear — pattern. Each stage requires specific strengths from various care models and care sectors.
The best outcomes result from a structured healing sequence:
1 Prevent Illness
(Or better yet, maximize health capability) including through self-care, wellness, and human services support (if needed) to counter social and holistic determinants of health
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
2 Contain Crisis
Including with pharmaceutical, technological, or surgical intervention (if needed) and social support
Western Care Model
Healthcare Sector
Human Services Sector
3 Activate Healing Program
Including improvements in sleep, nutrition, toxin load, movement, light/outdoor time, spiritual connection, self-talk, social interaction, and stress management
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
4 Optimize Lifestyle
Including improvements in sleep, nutrition, toxin load, movement, light/outdoor time, spiritual connection, self-talk, social interaction, and stress management
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
5 Cure Root Cause
Including addressing trauma, genetic, epigenetic, event-triggered, and social contributors to illness
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Healthcare Sector
Human Services Sector
6 Dissolve Compensations
Including releasing stored up emotional biochemicals, fascial casting, and chronic pain systems
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
7 Reset Programs
Including reprogramming nervous system, hormones, cellular metabolism, and other responses
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
8 Graduate to Self-Care
The goal of all care is to graduate the client to lower and lower levels of care until the client can return to self-care.
Human Services
In addition to the eight generally sequential stages above, the Complex Illness Healing Journey has four supports, which can run concurrently with any or all stages above:
A Support Symptoms
Including with pharmaceutical, technological, or surgical intervention (if needed), wellness services, and social support
Western Care Model
Eastern Care Model
Integrative Care Model
Holistic Care Model
Healthcare Sector
Wellness Sector
Human Services Sector
B Augment Basic Needs
Complex illness can interrupt a person’s ability to care for themselves. Augmenting basic needs includes food, water, clothing, and shelter. These needs must be met before anyone feels safe enough to active their healing program.
Human Services Sector
Holistic Care Model
C Receive Social Support
Social support allows us to share our burdens with others so that we do not feel so isolated and alone.
Human Services Sector
Holistic Care Model
D Accommodate to Abilities
Provide vocational, community, and housing modifications, assistance, services, and technology to enable thriving (and do better than this AI-generated attempt at a sign with Brail… sigh.)
Human Services Sector
Holistic Care Model
Blogs About Our Approach
Western Medicine Confirms Eastern Medicine
Hi! Tenay here. I just found out about something Western researchers found in 2018 and I am so excited about it. It’s called the interstitium, and it might be one of the most important anatomy discoveries in a very long time. Here’s what happened. In 2015, two doctors at a New York hospital were running…
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Hi, there! Tenay here. I wanted to share a little bit of our process with you as we progress through our National Science Foundation’s Research to Market program. As we have continued conducting our semi-structured interviews with professionals in the health, wellness, and human services space, we’ve discovered that there is no single term to…
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In hindsight, I was showing all the signs: anxiety, depression, compulsions, addictions. I couldn’t regulate my emotions, and I was self-destructive. I had post-traumatic stress disorder. It took me thirty-three years before I realized it. Today, I can recognize these signs and more in one-quarter to one-third of the population (some of you can, too),…
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Making Yoga Better
Any healer can improve the healing benefit of their therapeutic technique by combining it with other techniques that target other parts of a Seven-Part Person that make sense.
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