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Catie Westra, BSN, RN, FNP, BC
Family Nurse Practitioner - Specializing in Hormones
Catie Westra is a critical care nurse, family nurse practitioner, certified yogini and level 1 Reiki practitioner who believes patients are important players in their own wellness journeys. She collaborates with patients to help them achieve their optimal selves and show up as their best version on most days. Catie has cared for numerous chronically ill patients and strongly believes that many of the illnesses seen in today's society could be avoided with lifestyle modification, proper nutrition and supplementation. She also understands that life is a balancing act. In today's technologically driven, fast paced society a holistic lifestyle involves practice, not perfection. Her areas of interest include precision medicine (wearables), health optimization, hormone therapy, and the science and art of longevity. Her mottos to live by include: 1) eat good food, but not too much, 2) move enough and 3) sleep enough - not necessarily in that order.
Along with many siblings and neighborhood children, Catie grew up barefoot and surrounded by wildlife on one of the last dirt roads in Miami, Florida. Her mom was a NICU nurse, home-birth midwife and lactation consultant. Her father was a french teacher, carpenter and sailor. Catie came to North Carolina on a scholarship to Davidson College where she ran division 1 track and cross-country. She is also a competitive swimmer and believes movement of any type is therapy. She graduated from Davidson in 2011 with a self-created major in science non-fiction writing which involved translating peer-reviewed research articles into copy for the public. In 2013 she lived in Indore, India where she studied kundalini yoga at the Paramanand Institute of Yogic Sciences and became a yoga practitioner. She returned to the states permanently in 2015. In 2019 she earned her second Bachelors of Science in Nursing and in April 2023 she completed her Masters of Nursing, Family Nurse Practitioner Degree from Simmons University of Boston.
"I believe patients can intuitively know when something is not quite right with their bodies," Catie says, "even if they cannot pinpoint what exactly it is that is wrong. That is where the collaborative role of the provider-patient relationship comes in. There is a famous quote by William Osler that says Listen to your patient, (s)he is telling you the diagnosis. And I firmly believe this is true.