about dr. orna izakson

Dr. Orna Izakson is a writer, registered herbalist, and an Alaska- and Oregon-licensed naturopathic physician based in Portland, Oregon.

Her love of wild places brought her to plants and their medicine, which she now works to share with patients, practitioners and the public.

Dr. Orna works with patients in Oregon and Alaska, and offers an array of free and paid resources to help people take control of their health.

In 2013 she launched the Traditional Roots Institute at National University of Natural Medicine, working to bring the people’s medicine back to the people. Over more than six years as its lead physician, her work trained hundreds of providers and prospective patients in the practical and profound uses of herbal medicine.

An avid photographer since childhood, Dr. Orna can often be found sprawled by the side of the road with her camera lens set uncomfortably close to some pretty flower. (See her images on Instagram.)

Before starting her medical career, Dr. Orna was an award-winning journalist whose work appeared in publications including the Los Angeles Times, The Bangor Daily News, E/The Environmental Magazine, Willamette Week and High Country News. She has published chapters in Feeling the Heat: Dispatches from the Frontlines of Climate Change” (Routledge, 2004) and “Green Living: The E Magazine Handbook for Living Lightly on the Earth” (Plume, 2005).

She is currently at work on several books about natural health.

Memberships:
Oregon Association of Naturopathic Physicians
Alaska Association of Naturopathic Doctors (Vice President)
American Association of Naturopathic Physicians
American Herbalists Guild
Society of Environmental Journalists
Psychiatric Association of Naturopathic Physicians
Climate Psychiatry Alliance