The Disease Delusion: Conquering the Causes of Chronic Illness for a Healthier, Longer, and Happier Life


Jeffrey S. Bland - 2014
    Jeffrey Bland has been on the cutting edge of Functional Medicine, which seeks to pinpoint and prevent the cause of illness, rather than treat its symptoms. Managing chronic diseases accounts for three quarters of our total healthcare costs, because we're masking these illnesses with pills and temporary treatments, rather than addressing their underlying causes, he argues. Worse, only treating symptoms leads us down the path of further illness.In The Disease Delusion, Dr. Bland explains what Functional Medicine is and what it can do for you. While advances in modern science have nearly doubled our lifespans in only four generations, our quality of life has not reached its full potential. Outlining the reasons why we suffer chronic diseases from asthma and diabetes to obesity, arthritis and cancer to a host of other ailments, Dr. Bland offers achievable, science-based solutions that can alleviate these common conditions and offers a roadmap for a lifetime of wellness.

Make or Break: Don't Let Climbing Injuries Dictate Your Success


Dave MacLeod - 2015
    Sooner or later, nearly all climbers get injured and it will be injuries that ultimately dictate how far you get in climbing, if you let them. Unfortunately, the data shows it takes over a decade just to get small proportions of medical research adopted in regular practice. Sourcing reliable and up to date advice on preventing and treating finger, elbow, shoulder and other climbing injuries is challenging to say the least. You need to be the expert, because there are so many strands of knowledge and practice to pull together to stay healthy as a climber, and no single source of advice to cover all of these. The book draws together both the cutting edge of peer reviewed sports medicine research, and the subtle concepts of changing your climbing habits and routine to prevent and successfully recover from injuries. It is a handbook on how to take care of yourself as a lifelong climbing athlete. By spanning the fields of climbing coaching, physiotherapy, sports medicine and behavioural science, it goes beyond the general advice on treating symptoms offered by sports medicine textbooks and into much more detail on technique and habits specific to climbing than the existing climbing literature base. You will learn how your current climbing habits are already causing your future injuries and what you can do to change that. If you are already injured, it will prevent you from prolonging your injury with the wrong climbing habits and rehabilitation choices. You will learn how the ingredients of prevention and good recovery come from wildly different sources and how you have been using only a fraction of them. Fully referenced throughout, the practical advice for diagnosis, rehabilitation and prevention of climbing injuries is drawn from up to date peer reviewed sports medicine research.

The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human


V.S. Ramachandran - 2011
    S. Ramachandran is at the forefront of his field-so much so that Richard Dawkins dubbed him the "Marco Polo of neuroscience." Now, in a major new work, Ramachandran sets his sights on the mystery of human uniqueness. Taking us to the frontiers of neurology, he reveals what baffling and extreme case studies can teach us about normal brain function and how it evolved. Synesthesia becomes a window into the brain mechanisms that make some of us more creative than others. And autism--for which Ramachandran opens a new direction for treatment--gives us a glimpse of the aspect of being human that we understand least: self-awareness. Ramachandran tackles the most exciting and controversial topics in neurology with a storyteller's eye for compelling case studies and a researcher's flair for new approaches to age-old questions. Tracing the strange links between neurology and behavior, this book unveils a wealth of clues into the deepest mysteries of the human brain.

Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health


H. Gilbert Welch - 2011
    Gilbert WelchRead Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health PDF from Beacon Press,H. Gilbert WelchDownload H. Gilbert Welch's PDF E-book Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health

Far from the Tree: Parents, Children, and the Search for Identity


Andrew Solomon - 2012
    He writes about families coping with deafness, dwarfism, Down's syndrome, autism, schizophrenia, or multiple severe disabilities; with children who are prodigies, who are conceived in rape, who become criminals, who are transgender. While each of these characteristics is potentially isolating, the experience of difference within families is universal, and Solomon documents triumphs of love over prejudice in every chapter.All parenting turns on a crucial question: to what extent should parents accept their children for who they are, and to what extent they should help them become their best selves. Drawing on ten years of research and interviews with more than three hundred families, Solomon mines the eloquence of ordinary people facing extreme challenges.Elegantly reported by a spectacularly original and compassionate thinker, Far from the Tree explores how people who love each other must struggle to accept each other—a theme in every family’s life.

The Procrastination Equation: How to Stop Putting Things Off and Start Getting Stuff Done


Piers Steel - 2010
    Writing with humour, humanity and solid scientific information reminiscent of Stumbling on Happiness and Freakonomics, Piers Steel explains why we knowingly and willingly put off a course of action despite recognizing we'll be worse off for it.For those who surf the Web instead of finishing overdue assignments, who always say diets start tomorrow, who stay up late watching TV to put off going to sleep, The Procrastination Equation explains why we do what we do — or in this case don't — and why in Western societies we're in the midst of an escalating procrastination epidemic.Dr. Piers Steel takes on the myths and misunderstandings behind procrastination and motivation — showing us how procrastination affects our lives, health, careers and happiness and what we can do about it. With accessible prose and the benefits of new scientific research, he provides insight into why we procrastinate even though the result is that we are less happy, healthy, even wealthy. Who procrastinates and why? How many ways, big and small, do we procrastinate? How can we stop doing it? The reasons are part cultural, part psychological, part biological. And, with a million new ways to distract ourselves in the digitized world — all of which feed on our built-in impulsiveness — more of us are potentially damaging ourselves by putting things off. But Steel not only analyzes the factors that weigh us down but the things that motivate us — including understanding the value of procrastination.

Disease-Proof: The Remarkable Truth About What Makes Us Well


David L. Katz - 2013
    In Disease-Proof, renowned preventive medicine specialist Dr. David Katz reveals that we can reduce our risk of any chronic disease by an astonishing 80 percent—more than any drug or intervention could ever hope to do. Abundant scientific evidence shows that four simple things—not smoking, eating well, being active, and maintaining a healthy weight—play an enormous role in our health. Drawing upon the latest scientific evidence and decades of clinical experience, Dr. Katz arms us with the skills to make lasting changes in each of these areas. Disease-Proof equips readers with the knowledge to manage weight, improve immune function, reprogram our genes, and prevent and reverse life-altering illnesses. Groundbreaking and timely, this book is for readers of The End of Illness by David Agus and Anticancer by David Servan-Schreiber.

An Elegant Defense: The Extraordinary New Science of the Immune System: A Tale in Four Lives


Matt Richtel - 2019
    An epic, first-of-its-kind book, entwining leading-edge scientific discovery with the intimate stories of four individual lives, by the Pulitzer Prize–winning New York Times journalist.A terminal cancer patient rises from the grave. A medical marvel defies HIV. Two women with autoimmunity discover their own bodies have turned against them. Matt Richtel's An Elegant Defense uniquely entwines these intimate stories with science’s centuries-long quest to unlock the mysteries of sickness and health, and illuminates the immune system as never before.The immune system is our body’s essential defense network, a guardian vigilantly fighting illness, healing wounds, maintaining order and balance, and keeping us alive. Its legion of microscopic foot soldiers—from T cells to “natural killers”—patrols our body, linked by a nearly instantaneous communications grid. It has been honed by evolution over millennia to face an almost infinite array of threats.For all its astonishing complexity, however, the immune system can be easily compromised by fatigue, stress, toxins, advanced age, and poor nutrition—hallmarks of modern life—and even by excessive hygiene. Paradoxically, it is a fragile wonder weapon that can turn on our own bodies with startling results, leading today to epidemic levels of autoimmune disorders.Richtel effortlessly guides readers on a scientific detective tale winding from the Black Plague to twentieth-century breakthroughs in vaccination and antibiotics, to the cutting-edge laboratories that are revolutionizing immunology—perhaps the most extraordinary and consequential medical story of our time. The foundation that Richtel builds makes accessible revelations about cancer immunotherapy, the microbiome, and autoimmune treatments that are changing millions of lives. An Elegant Defense also captures in vivid detail how these powerful therapies, along with our behavior and environment, interact with the immune system, often for the good but always on a razor’s edge that can throw this remarkable system out of balance.Drawing on his groundbreaking reporting for the New York Times and based on extensive new interviews with dozens of world-renowned scientists, Matt Richtel has produced a landmark book, equally an investigation into the deepest riddles of survival and a profoundly human tale that is movingly brought to life through the eyes of his four main characters, each of whom illuminates an essential facet of our “elegant defense.”

Doing Action Research In Your Own Organization


David Coghlan - 2000
    In this brand new edition of the popular work, David Coghlan and Teresa Brannick provide an easy-to-follow, hands-on guide to every aspect of conducting an action research project in your own organization.Revised and updated, this Third Edition contains: An expanded discussion on politics and ethics of insider action researchAn expanded chapter on writing an action research dissertation and an action research report More case examples and reflective exercises taken from a wide variety of organizational settings

Natural Hormone Balance for Women: Look Younger, Feel Stronger, and Live Life with Exuberance


Uzzi Reiss - 2001
    Uzzi Reiss shows the way for women who want to turn back the effects of time through natural hormone therapy, but who wonder: is it safe? Does it work? Is hormone therapy right for me?Natural Hormone Balance for Women is Dr. Reiss's breakthrough, step-by-step program for women who want to take control of their lives by restoring hormonal balance. This revolutionary, commonsense natural hormone replacement program is designed to meet the individual needs of most women looking to rejuvenate body and mind—and offers astounding benefits for women of all ages: More energy and stamina * Improved memory * Healthier, more youthful skin * Balanced moods * Less depression and anxiety * Stabilization of weight and more muscle definition * Better sleep patterns * PMS and menopausal symptoms reduced or eliminated * Enhanced sexuality Dr. Reiss takes the confusion out of the medical information you need to know. In clear, nontechnical language, he thoroughly explains: -the important difference between standard chemical hormone prescriptions and natural hormone replacements -which hormone replacements are best for you and how to adjust them to your maximum individual benefit -how to take hormones without worry -how to choose the most effective hormonal gel, cream, pill, or sublingual drops, and when to use them. Dr. Reiss has helped thousands of women transform their lives by achieving natural hormone balance. Now you can tap into the replenishing "fountain of youthfulness" that is not only essential for better life, but easier and safer to achieve than ever before.

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders DSM-IV-TR


American Psychiatric Association - 1952
    Updated information is included about the associated features, culture, age & gender features, prevalence, course & familial pattern of mental disorders. The DSM-IV-TR(R) brings this essential diagnostic tool to-date, to promote effective diagnosis, treatment & quality of care. One can get all the essential diagnostic information from the DSM-IV(R) along with important updates not in the '94 edition. Benefit from new research into Schizophrenia, Asperger's Disorder & other conditions. Utilize additional information about the epidemiology & other facets of DSM conditions. Update ICD-9-CM codes implemented since 1994 including Conduct Disorder, Dementia, Somatoform Disorders.Use of the manual DSM-IV-TR classification Multiaxial assessment Disorders usually 1st diagnosed in infancy, childhood or adolescenceDelirium, dementia & amnestic & other cognitive disordersMental disorders due to a general medical condition Substance-related disorders Schizophrenia & other psychotic disordersMood disorders Anxiety disordersSomatoform disordersFactitious disordersDissociative disordersSexual & gender identity disordersEating disorders Sleep disorders Impulse-control disorders not elsewhere classifiedAdjustment disordersPersonality disordersOther conditions that may be a focus of clinical attentionAdditional codes Appendix A: Decision trees for differential diagnosis Appendix B: Criteria sets & axes provided for further study Appendix C: Glossary of technical terms Appendix D: Highlights of changes in DSM-IV text revisionAppendix E: Alphabetical listing of DSM-IV-TR diagnoses & codesAppendix F: Numerical listing of DSM-IV-TR diagnoses & codesAppendix G: ICD-9-CM codes for selected general medical conditions & medication-induced disordersAppendix H: DSM-IV classification with ICD-10 codesAppendix I: Outline for cultural formulation & glossary of culture-bound syndromesAppendix J: DSM-IV contributorsAppendix K: DSM-IV text revision advisers

Divided Minds: Twin Sisters and Their Journey Through Schizophrenia


Pamela Spiro Wagner - 2005
    But as the twins approached adolescence, Pamela began to succumb to schizophrenia, hearing disembodied voices and eventually suffering many breakdowns and hospitalizations.Divided Minds is a dual memoir of identical twins, one of whom faces a life sentence of schizophrenia, and the other who becomes a psychiatrist, after entering the spotlight that had for so long been focused on her sister. Told in the alternating voices of the sisters, Divided Minds is a heartbreaking account of the far reaches of madness, as well as the depths of ambivalence and love between twins. It is a true and unusually frank story of identical twins with very different identities and wildly different experiences of the world around them.

Saving My Knees: How I Proved My Doctors Wrong and Beat Chronic Knee Pain


Richard Bedard - 2011
    Richard Bedard was a journalist in his mid-40s, living abroad, when he was diagnosed with patellofemoral pain syndrome, or chondromalacia patella. His burning joints made his life so miserable that he fantasized about hacking off his kneecaps. Four doctors failed to help; one said he would never get better. His physical therapist finally gave up too.Unable to sit normally, he quit his job. Unemployed and desperate, he launched a year-long, round-the-clock experiment to save his knees. He read from scores of clinical studies, medical textbooks, health newsletters. What he discovered left him stunned. There was a familiar story about what patellofemoral pain syndrome was and how to treat it: The advice to focus on strengthening the quads. To stretch. To take glucosamine. To forget about cartilage healing, because that never happened.And that story was completely wrong.Armed with this knowledge, he fashioned a plan to get better. Within two years, he fully recovered. This compelling story chronicles a long journey of healing and discovery. It shows that a patient’s true ally isn’t simply hope, but informed hope.

The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth


M. Scott Peck - 1978
    "Psychotherapy is all things to all people in this mega-selling pop-psychology watershed, which features a new introduction by the author in this 25th anniversary edition. His agenda in this tome, which was first published in 1978 but didn't become a bestseller until 1983, is to reconcile the psychoanalytic tradition with the conflicting cultural currents roiling the 70s. In the spirit of Me-Decade individualism and libertinism, he celebrates self-actualization as life's highest purpose and flirts with the notions of open marriage and therapeutic sex between patient and analyst. But because he is attuned to the nascent conservative backlash against the therapeutic worldview, Peck also cites Gospel passages, recruits psychotherapy to the cause of traditional religion (he even convinces a patient to sign up for divinity school) and insists that problems must be overcome through suffering, discipline and hard work (with a therapist.) Often departing from the cerebral and rationalistic bent of Freudian discourse for a mystical, Jungian tone more compatible with New Age spirituality, Peck writes of psychotherapy as an exercise in "love" and "spiritual growth," asserts that "our unconscious is God" and affirms his belief in miracles, reincarnation and telepathy. Peck's synthesis of such clashing elements (he even throws in a little thermodynamics) is held together by a warm and lucid discussion of psychiatric principles and moving accounts of his own patients' struggles and breakthroughs. Harmonizing psychoanalysis and spirituality, Christ and Buddha, Calvinist work ethic and interminable talking cures, this book is a touchstone of our contemporary religio-therapeutic culture." -- Publishers WeeklyKeywords: MIND & BODY PSYCHOLOGY SOCIOLOGY RELIGION

The First Survivors of Alzheimer's: How Patients Recovered Life and Hope in Their Own Words


Dale E. Bredesen - 2021
    In his first two books, Dr. Dale Bredesen outlined the revolutionary treatments that are changing what had previously seemed like the inevitable outcome of cognitive decline and dementia. And in these moving narratives, you can hear directly from the first survivors of Alzheimer's themselves--their own amazing stories of hope told in their own words. These first person accounts honestly detail the fear, struggle, and ultimate victory of each patient's journey. They vividly describe what it is like to have Alzheimer's. They also drill down on how each of these patients made the program work for them--the challenges, the workarounds, the encouraging results that are so motivating. Dr. Bredesen includes commentary following each story to help point readers to the tips and tricks that might help them as well.Dr. Bredesen's patients have not just survived; they have thrived to rediscover fulfilling lives, rewarding relationships, and meaningful work. This book will give unprecedented hope to patients and their families.