Customer Reviews

Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes: 5 Essential Health Factors You Can Master to Enjoy a Long and Healthy Life (Marlowe Diabetes Library)

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I found this book depressing and infuriating. It promotes the irresponsible advice of the ADA, which not only keeps diabetics from developing complications, it leads them down that path. Then it tells them diabetes is progressive after all, and they should just keep upping their meds to deal with all the carbs they are advised to eat.

This book has some good points. It does tell diabetics what numbers they need to keep in line. But its idea of what the glucose numbers should be are very damaging.

The book calls an A1c of 7.2 "respectable" and 7.6 "not too shabby." It claims there is no benefit to an A1c of 6.0 over a 7.0, which is outright false. Even the ADA says a NON-diabetic level (4.0-6.0) is ideal, though it's pretty hard to get that low by following their low fat/high carb advice.

Don't waste your money on this book! It just patronizes diabetics and tells them they aren't to blame when their meds are maxed out and they're still getting complications while doing what the ADA (and its followers) told them to do.

Follow an eating plan that truly controls the carbs (which are sugar to your body) you are eating and you can prevent or at least slow down the complications without all the meds. The ADA knows it works, but won't recommend it because "it's too hard" to stick with. Don't let the ADA (and its followers) make your decisions for you. Inform yourself! This book won't do that.

Lose 30 pounds. Get your blood pressure down. Lower your LDL cholesterol and triglycerides and get that HDL cholesterol up. Keep an eye on your blood sugar and have it checked often.

Does any of this sound familiar? Sure it does and you may have even heard it from your own doctor regarding your flailing health because of you are overweight or obese. It's the dreaded lecture that comes from physicians when they see certain health indicators come back as irregular.

But what if what you are dealing with is something even more life-threatening than just a bout with obesity, hypertension, or a poor lipid profile? What if it's one of the most dreaded of all diseases that makes you feel like your world has come to an official end? That's exactly what happens to some people when they are told they have been diagnosed with diabetes.

What did I do to cause this? How can something like this happen to me? Will I ever live a "normal" life again or am I destined for a life of painful insulin injections, expensive prescription medications, and endless doctor visits for the rest of my life?

These thoughts are not only very real to people who are told they have diabetes, but it can paralyze them even when they otherwise have their life under complete control. Diabetes has quite literally turned the life of millions of people upside down and leaves them with very little hope or help. Where can people turn when they are faced with such despair about this complex disease they have?

Whether you are Type 1 or Type 2 diabetic, then you have undoubtedly been given some all-too-familiar generic advice about handling your diabetes (like I illustrated at the beginning of this review) which is all meant to help you I am sure. Unfortunately, though, this kind of one-size-fits-all approach to diabetes is not only shortsighted, but incredibly ineffective.

That's where the mostly informative new book from Harvard medical professor and Joslin Diabetes Center investigator Dr. Richard Jackson as well as saucy and always on point professional journalist, blogger, and diabetes sufferer Amy Tenderich comes into play. It's called Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes: 5 Essential Health Factors You Can Master To Enjoy A Long And Healthy Life (Marlowe Diabetes Library) and will quickly become your handy reference resource guide for almost everything you ever wanted to know about diabetes.

I say "almost" for a reason which I will explain in a moment.

First, the good parts of this book. It is very well put together in an enjoyable format mixing a healthy dose of diabetes facts alongside some hands-on practical advice about how to best implement the proper lifestyle changes that need to take place for optimal diabetes management. While this can be a rather drab and boring topic to discuss, Dr. Jackson and Tenderich do a yeoman's job of keeping it fun and engaging.

And I really like the fact that the authors strongly urge people living with diabetes to implement permanent lifestyle changes. At the same time, they push the positive message that diabetics don't necessarily need to attempt to make multiple changes all at once, but instead slowly begin to work them into their individual routine incrementally. I agree with this bit-by-bit strategy because it is the best way to make the changes take hold and become a permanent habit whether it is with weight loss, diabetes, or anything else. Breaking out of those old habits takes time.

Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes hits the ground running right away in the first six chapters explaining why you need to be concerned about your health when you have diabetes and points to the five tests that every single diabetic absolutely must have checked regularly if they are going to lick this disease by learning to manage it well.

What are these five tests? Very simply put, it's the following:

1. Your A1C
2. Your blood pressure
3. Your lipid profile (cholesterol)
4. Your microalbumin (What?! Don't worry, they explain!)
5. Your eye exam

While Dr. Jackson and Tenderich do not explicitly recommend people who are not diabetic to have these tests conducted, I think it is an extremely good idea considering there are tens of millions more pre-diabetics walking around and have no idea they are either already or becoming insulin resistant. Taking preventative action now would likely slow down the expected diabetes boom coming over the next few decades.

You can certainly appreciate the "been there, done that" feel of this book which does a fabulous job of removing the mystery and awe out of diabetes for good. Whether you have just been diagnosed with diabetes or even if you are a decades-long veteran living with the disease, there is plenty of useful statistics and data to keep you occupied for hours as you learn all the ins and outs of diabetes.

But I have one pretty major concern about the book that makes me say it is "almost" a comprehensive look at the subject of diabetes. While there is plenty of discussion about carbohydrates and how controlling your intake of them whether they are in the form of sugar, pasta, rice, potatoes, or otherwise in Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes, the lack of a real sense of urgency about trying to keep them limited as a means for managing diabetes is not emphasized heavily enough and given the significance it deserves. All the latest research indicates that reducing carb intake can bring about permanent control of diabetes and you just don't hear this message stated explicitly in this book.

For a book like this about diabetes releasing in the year 2007, how can you totally ignore the many years of clinical studies (like this one) that have been conducted by valient researchers like Dr. Eric Westman from Duke University and Dr. Mary C. Vernon from the University of Kansas and the co-author of Atkins Diabetes Revolution? What about Dr. Steve Phinney or Dr. Jay Wortman? And let's not forget Dr. Mary Gannon and Dr. Frank Nuttall, too! I could easily continue on with many more names, but these are enough to get you started.

Not only have these amazing researchers shown the vital statistics for their diabetic patients become normalized, but many of them were able to come completely off of all their prescription medicines for good. GASP! How can this be? You'd never know this was possible if you only read this book because there was no mention of ending diabetes drug use in Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes--NONE! Just the strong "now take your medicines regularly along with a low-fat diet" message that diabetics have had to suffer through long enough.

Where was the promotion of this major "cure" for diabetes which was highlighted nationally by Adam Campbell in Men's Health magazine in November 2006 found within the pages of this diabetes book, hmmm? The glaring absence of this cutting edge information about diabetes is like talking to someone about how to drive a car that doesn't have a steering wheel. Sure, you may get somewhere, but not necessarily where you want to go.

Furthermore, there was nary a single mention of the most famous diabetes expert who has implored a low-carb solution to his Type 1 diabetes for decades--the amazing Dr. Richard Bernstein! This man has done more to add quality of life and even saved the lives of millions of diabetics through his bestselling books and personal practice. However, if you read Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes it's as if Dr. Bernstein and his common sense strategies for tackling diabetes don't even exist. Shame on them for this grave omission!

To be honest, it was quite scary reading over and over again in this supposedly all-encompassing book on the topic of diabetes that people with this disease need to consume as much as 60 percent carbohydrates daily, including regular servings of sugar if they want it "in moderation!" Say what?! ARGH!

Are they trying to make these people get sicker and sicker?! What kind of irresponsible advice like this is being given to diabetics?! Yikeseroo! How about just giving them a little arsenic "in moderation" while you're at it, too? Sheeez!

Yet, at the same time, the authors emphasize the critical nature of carbohydrate reduction in the management of diabetes. So which is it? I understand we are all different with a variety of factors that will work for the individual person, but come on! I'm a big believer in people finding what works for them in weight loss and health management at my blog, but I see no downside for diabetics who want to control their disease naturally through diet by livin` la vida low-carb.

What will happen if diabetics decide to take the low-carb pathway to reversing the effects of their disease is they will get better than they've ever been before, seeing their A1C drop into "normal" range and staying there, lower their blood pressure, significantly drop their triglycerides, raise their HDL cholesterol levels, and ward off many of the inevitable future health issues due to their diabetes. Not a bad deal if you ask me!

Of course, the lack of any information about the low-carb nutritional approach to combat diabetes in Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes may have more to do with the American Diabetes Association and their ill-advised recommendations than anything else. It is quite clear that Dr. Jackson and Tenderich relied heavily on their skewed advice for diabetics.

You see the unmistakable fingerprints of their needless warnings about lowering LDL cholesterol (with even MORE medications such as statins--EEEK!), avoiding saturated fat, lowering salt intake, and controlling fat, calories, and portion sizes in page after page of this book. It really was more than a little nauseating to read all of this information while "low-carb" was nowhere to be found. I can't tell you how incredibly disappointing this was to me because diabetics who read this book will be left in the dark about what very well could be the solution to their disease.

While I certainly can appreciate what Dr. Richard Jackson and Amy Tenderich have done with their book Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes to help educate people with this disease get the basic information they may be looking for, it is the blatant omission of critical information about low-carb as a viable treatment option for diabetes that has me gravely concerned.

And if you are diabetic, you deserve to be armed with all the facts so you really can "outlive your diabetes."

Having read Amy Tenderich's Diabetes Mine blog for some time, I pre-ordered this book.

First of all it's an easy read. Yes there's some repetition, I kept hearing the drumbeat of more exercise, more exercise as I went through the book. But this isn't a book of bad news for people with diabetes. It's a book all about how you can focus your efforts on things that really need the work.

Amy and Richard Jackson do a great job of explaining the five factors (my ordering of these): A1C; lipids; blood pressure; microalbumin; and eyes. They show what the various numbers mean for the first four and how to work on improving the values you're getting.

One value I got from reading, before I was half-way through the book, was that I finally really understood the exercise thing. So I've purchased a pedometer and am always looking for an excuse to work more.

I also like their idea of determining which ones are problems for you. This is like paying off your highest interest debt, rather than your largest on. Find out which health factor is the most problematic for you and improve that one. Then you can move on to the next.

I think this book is essential reading for anyone with diabetes whether Type 1 or Type 2. I highly recommend it.

I am a type I diabetic. Then again, I am also an Amazon.com reviewer. So whenever I can get my hands on a good book on diabetes or its treatment, I do. The most recent book on the topic I've had a chance to read has been Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes: 5 Essential Health Factors You Can Master to Enjoy a Long and Healthy Life by Richard Jackson, M.D. and Amy Tenderich, author of DiabetesMine.com.

The book, which takes a little under 300 pages, combines the medical knowledge of Dr. Jackson with the real life experience of Amy, who dedicated herself to writing about diabetes after being diagnosed with type I diabetes in May 2003, in her mid-thirties. The result is an amazing title aimed at focusing the diabetic patient on five fundamental factors to help him/her lead a long and healthy life. These factors are: your A1C, your blood pressure, your lipids, your microalbumin and your eye exam, to discard retinopathy.

After showing readers through the five main indicators, the authors present courses of action to track them and maintain them in control through exercise, food/diet, medications and monitoring. Towards the end of the book, there are chapters dedicated to the understanding of both type II and type I diabetes, as well as the so-called metabolic syndrome and the actual dangers faced by children of diabetics. The last few chapters deal with travel, feet and mouth care, emotional care and alternative treatment options for diabetics.

Though the book has a slight emphasis on type II diabetes, honestly all diabetics can find useful information in it. Since the publishing of Dr. Berstein's Diabetes Solution, I haven't encountered such a compelling and intuitive title for diabetics. I highly recommend it.

This Book is wonderful especially for the newly diagnosed Diabetic, it is very informative and helpful.I learned a great deal. I would suggest this book to be a part of required reading for all diabetics.

I wish I could put a copy of Know Your Numbers, Outlive Your Diabetes: 5 Essential Health Factors You Can Master to Enjoy a Long and Healthy Life in every diabetes clinic. Better yet, in the hands of every person with type 2 diabetes.

Richard Jackson, MD and Amy Tenderich provide a realistic guide to diabetes, particularly type 2 diabetes, with this book. The focus is on the results of the five tests that determine diabetes health (A1C, blood pressure, lipids, microalbumin, and eye exam) and the importance of physical activity rather than providing another lecture about weight loss and forbidden foods. Countering fears about insulin is another important aspect of this book. If someone needs insulin to keep good results coming on the five key tests, they should not fear it - they should embrace it as a way to curb future complications.

I might not be able to provide a copy to every person with type 2 diabetes...or even every diabetes clinic, but I can lend my copy to those interested in learning more about their own or their loved one's condition.

Many of us fear what we do not know, which could be why the diagnosis of diabetes is so harrowing. Fear no more. Amy Tenderich and Dr. Richard Jackson, MD teamed up to shed some light on the heaps of material we must digest to control our diabetes. They have simply explained it all in this book.

It begins by explaining the five tests that are the cornerstones for monitoring your overall health with diabetes. These tests are: A1c, blood pressure, lipids, microalbumin, and an annual eye exam. You may think you know it all because you've been there, done that. But do you really know - what it tests, why it's done, and what your numbers should look like? After you learn what those tests mean to you and your health - Amy and Dr. Jackson help you develop a plan of action. They build a road, paved with easy to understand (and explained remarkably well) information about nutrition, medicine, organic treatments, support, and specialized shopping sites for diabetes.

I was impressed beyond my expectations. Knowing the award winning caliber of work Amy produces, and the integrity of Dr. Jackson's work with Joslin Diabetes Center and Harvard Medical - I was looking for a good guidebook on diabetes care. No ma'am. This book is AWESOME! I knew it would be good, Amy. You've outdone yourself, once again. I hope this book motivates everyone who reads it to know their numbers and outlive their diabetes.

I have always expereience quality and professional service throuigh amazon . Thanks for your consistancy of great services.

A great book!! It's core message: IF YOU TAKE CARE OF THESE FIVE CRITICAL ISSUES, THERE IS NO REASON YOU CANNOT LIVE A LONG, HEALTY AND HAPPY LIFE. It is not Diabetes that leads to complications and a short life, but the mismanagement of these five critical numbers. Spells out EVERYTHING you need to know about these five issues. Everything is super clear and well laid out. Gives great game plans for management, taking control of your own condition and issues, how to make the most of doctor visits. Debunks common myths about Diabetes and unveils little known truths.

In the 9 months since I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, I've read numerous books, countless articles in magazines, tens of websites and blogs and gotten a great deal of information from doctors, dietitians, and various diabetes educators, but this is far and away the most positive, hopeful and most importantly best read of any of the books.

When one is diagnosed with a chronic disease, it's a life-changing moment: you wonder how you will deal with the diagnosis physically and emotionally, both now and in the future, and how your loved ones will react. Jackson and Tenderich give a hopeful assessment, and don't scare the reader like some other books for diabetes (the fire-and-brimstone version of medicine). But it's not all positive--the authors talk about many of the downsides of diabetic health-risks, but always offer effective ways to avoid these outcomes.

The 5 essential health factors from the title are: A1C (test assessing blood sugar for a 3-4 month period), Blood Pressure, Lipids, Microalbumin, and Eye Exam. The authors assert that if these 5 areas are under control, the awful complications those of us with diabetes dread (kidney failure, blindness, stroke, heart attack) can be averted.

The first four chapters are "action chapters"--the authors say that these four chapters contain the crux of the book, but the other chapters go into depth about various aspects of diabetes, such as "Understanding Hypo- and Hyperglycemia," "Traveling with Diabetes," and "Glucose Monitoring." I read the first four chapters the first day, gave myself a day to think about what I had read and went on to read the following chapters. This is a book that I didn't want to finish--I enjoyed reading it so much and had such a feeling of empowerment and hopefulness that I postponed finishing it for a week.

Dr. Richard Jackson is one of the leading physicians in the area of type 2 diabetes research and treatment (with the Joslin Diabetes Center and Harvard Medical School), and his insights into diabetes and the most up-to-date treatments are invaluable. Amy Tenderich is the woman behind Diabetes Mine, a wonderful website with all sorts of great information for people with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes (Amy was herself diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in her mid-30s a few years ago).

The bottom line from this book is exercise. Get up and get moving, because that is the most positive thing one can do to overcome the negative, long-term effects of diabetes.