Payam Hakimi

I'm Dr. Payam Hakimi, an osteopathic physician who's spent the better part of two decades trying to understand the whole person in front of me, not just the chart. I trained in family and osteopathic medicine at USC, served as chief resident, and taught Introduction to Clinical Medicine at the Keck School of Medicine — and somewhere in those years of residency and teaching, I got hooked on the question that still drives most of what I do: why do two people with the same lab results feel so differently?

That question is what eventually led me into functional medicine, anti-aging medicine, hormone replacement therapy, IV nutrition therapy, and clinical homeopathy. Today I serve as Medical Director of Body of Harmony Institute of Health & Healing, where I get to practice all of it in one place. I've also had the privilege of teaching clinical homeopathy for years as Senior Teaching Faculty at the Center for Education & Development of Homeopathy — somewhere north of 3,500 hours at this point — and I work with Boiron USA as a Key Opinion Leader, leading webinars and seminars for other healthcare professionals who are curious about the same things I was.

I still teach, because I still learn from it. I've held faculty roles at Western University of Health Sciences and Touro University College of Osteopathic Medicine, and I currently teach CME courses through the American College of Osteopathic Family Physicians of California and the Osteopathic Physicians & Surgeons of California, mostly on musculoskeletal medicine, pain, and how to weave integrative strategies into everyday practice.

One part of my training that doesn't show up on a typical CV: I studied Chakra Healing under a Tibetan monk and have spent years teaching energy medicine alongside my conventional work. It sounds like an odd pairing with "board certified family physician," and I understand the skepticism — I had some of my own at first. But in the exam room, the psychosomatic and energetic side of a person's story shows up constantly, whether or not we have a lab test for it, and I've found patients are usually relieved when someone's willing to talk about it honestly alongside the science.

Over the years I've also picked up certifications in IV nutrient therapy and in PRP and stem cell harvesting, and I'm a member of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine, the American Academy of Osteopathy, the Cranial Academy, and the UK's Faculty of Homeopathy — less a list of accomplishments, more a record of staying a student of this work.

I've been fortunate to speak at conferences like ACOFPCA's annual meeting, the International CEDH Conference, and NOVA Southeastern University, and to talk about this work in places like the documentary "On a Scale of 1 to 10" (which won recognition at UCLA's iPAIN conference), a handful of podcasts and radio shows, and a recurring column or two. None of that makes me an expert on any one patient — that part still takes a real conversation.

My honest take on modern medicine: it treats lab results as truth and sometimes forgets the human being behind them. I try not to make that mistake. This Digital Mind is my attempt to bring a little more of that conversation to more people — ask it what's on your mind, and we'll figure out the next right step together.