About Marin Optimal Health

Dr. Sara Kendall Gordon, LAc DAOM

I specialize in Acupuncture, Oriental Medicine, Integrative and Functional Medicine, Nutritional Counseling, and various Body-Mind therapies. My care is personal, patient-centered and educational. As a Functional Medicine practitioner, I recognize and treat the body as a network of inter-related, cooperative systems that continually interact with and affect each other. My healing focus is on the whole person – their physical and medical condition, their lifestyle habits, their complex personalities, life-circumstances and more.

Using predictive lab testing, nutritional supplements and acupuncture treatments, I treat chronic and acute immune and autoimmune disorders, pain and inflammation, digestive, thyroid, hormones and endocrinology and optimizing brain function. I empower my patients to manage and monitor their own health and wellness by teaching them how the environment, stress, foods, and pathogens create damaging inflammatory effects in the body that lead to illness.

My protocols incorporate acupuncture with traditional Chinese and western herbal medicine, nutritional supplements, dietary, exercise and lifestyle approaches. I also use advanced lab tests to discover underlying environmental, genetic and lifestyle factors involved in acute and chronic illnesses.

As poor dietary habits are a factor in many ailments, I use clinical nutritional therapy to detox, repair and enhance the body’s compromised physiological processes. This may include high-quality herbal and nutritional supplements – specialized formulations of vitamins, herbs, antioxidants and minerals – that facilitate general circulation, elimination of waste, cellular replication, repair and maintenance, the transformation of food into energy, the transportation and distribution of nutrients throughout the body, and overall immune system health.

Since 1998, I’ve studied with Datis Kharrazian, DC, CNC, DABFM, and trained extensively in Functional Medicine, Neuro-Endocrine Immunology, Thyroid issues, Brain and Neurotransmitter assessment, Functional Blood Chemistry and Laboratory Assessment. I mentored closely with Dr. Stephen Stiteler, OMD, HMD, NMD, for over 14 years. In that time, I became a proficient bio-energetic practitioner using muscle testing and learned the foundational similarities of Oriental Medicine, Homeopathy and Naturopathy, and how to integrate these three models in my practice.

I received my Doctorate in Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine from Five Branches University, San Jose, California in 2009. In 1993, I earned my Masters in Traditional Oriental Medicine from Emperor’s College of Traditional Oriental Medicine in Santa Monica, California. Since then, I’ve been trained in many forms of acupuncture including Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Taiwanese, and French. I’ve also received certifications from the California School of Medical Science (Swedish massage, shiatsu, deep tissue bodywork), the Transpersonal Hypnotherapy Institute (transpersonal hypnotherapy, transpersonal NLP, and medical hypnosis), and Biodynamic Cranial Touch. I received my Bachelors of Fine Arts in Ballet with a Musical Theater emphasis in 1976 from the University of Utah, in Salt Lake City, Utah. Before embarking on my medical career I danced professionally for 13 years.

I’ve been a student and practitioner of meditation since 1980. I’m a fully certified teacher of the Realization Process through Judith Blackstone, PhD. I offer ongoing educational classes in optimal health and lifestyle. And I continue to dance with the Don’t Quit Your Day Job Dancers in Marin County, CA