Healthy at Home: Get Well and Stay Well Without Prescriptions Author: Tieraona Low Dog M.D. | Language: English | ISBN:
1426212585 | Format: EPUB
Healthy at Home: Get Well and Stay Well Without Prescriptions Description
Review
"Low Dog does a great job of balancing the appropriate times to take herbal remedies and provides clear instructions on using herbs and making teas, salves, and tinctures. Accessible and reliable."
-Library Journal
About the Author
With the wisdom of a modern medicine woman and the authority of an internationally respected doctor who is an expert in herbal medicine and dietary supplements, Tieraona Low Dog, M.D., represents a 21st-century wise woman actively building a platform in the new landscape of self-help healthcare. A renowned speaker and regular columnist for Prevention magazine, she is a leader in national health policy and regulatory issues.
- Hardcover: 336 pages
- Publisher: National Geographic; 1 edition (January 14, 2014)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1426212585
- ISBN-13: 978-1426212581
- Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
I reviewed an advance reader's edition, in softcover, provided by Amazon Vine. It's missing some of the herbal remedy recipes that will appear in the final edition. Normally a book at this stage is awaiting copy-proofing by someone competent in English; this advance copy was already way beyond the current standard for finished work.
So, what about the content? Let me start off by saying that Dr. Low Dog is an M.D. and by that training "should be" focusing on medicine with scant knowledge of health. However, she also has an extensive cultural and personal background in health. There are three bullet points on the cover; the third one starts with the word "prevention."
Because of language abuse, many people use the terms "health care" and "medical care" interchangeably. But they have very different meanings. Standard medical care practice is generally antagonistic toward health care. What's the difference? Health care is what you do to protect your health, prevent illness, and prevent injury. The main strategy is a sensible diet, something Americans generally oppose with an almost religious fervor. Just check out the grain-based products on any restaurant menu or in the typical grocery cart. Or ask yourself why the modern grocery store devotes an entire aisle to "osteoporosis in a can."
So any time I read a book on "health" and it's authored by an M.D., I am immediately suspicious. But as I read Dr. Low Dog's book, my suspicions gave way to awestruck gratitude that someone could produce such a helpful and authoritative work that could easily be life-changing for the reader.
And not just because she exhibits an accurate understanding of diet (something extremely rare among physicians).
Few people would contest that the popular mindset for treating illness and maintaining health has been skewed to believe in the omnipotent prescription pill. Society's been led to believe that no matter what ails you, there's a pill for that. Whether it's depression, acid reflux, heartburn or flatulence, modern science can tame it and that suggesting any treatments based on plants and natural sources conjure memories of Granny on the Beverly Hillbillies digging up roots outside Mr. Drysdale's country club.
The author of Health at Home, is an M.D. and takes a refreshingly balanced and scientifically documented approach to healthcare, and includes timely information that's just beginning to be understood and appreciated by so-called mainstream medicine. This is NOT a book about taking megadoses of vitamins or the latest fad Superfood or juice. Chapter 5, for example, is entitled Healing the Gut. Two thousand years ago Hippocrates said that all disease starts in the gut. The author acknowledges that, that, of course, is not an all inclusive truth, but points out some stimulating facts. Our digestive system has it's own independent nervous system called the enteric nervous system, or ENS, with 100 million neurons embedded within the gut walls from the esophagus to the anus. Roughly half of all dopamine and 90 percent of the body's serotonin in produced by the ENS. That is why improving a person's diet, eliminating gluten and dairy products, excess sugar and fats, for example has resulted in dramatic changes in debilitating anxiety in many patients. Also why taking SSRI's usually produce profound disruption in the gut, often causing diarrhea and intestinal upset. The gut micro biome is discussed, with it's more than 100 trillion microorganisms that inhabit it.
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