Customer Reviews

Medical Myths That Can Kill You: And the 101 Truths That Will Save, Extend, and Improve Your Life

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3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

As a practicing family doctor and author of Stay Healthy, Live Longer, Spend Wisely: Making Intelligent Choices in America's Healthcare System, I am a strong believer in empowering and educating patients so that they can make the right decisions to get the most out of life. As the only doctor in my family I don't think it is fair that only the people I know or care for are privy to the truth about staying healthy, so I looked forward to reading this book which has a similar same perspective.

Overall, the book was a mixed blessing. It has interesting factoids, ideas we should all take to heart, but at times is misleading. As a consumer and a patient, I thought the truths and news you can use pieces were interesting. As a primary care doctor and patient advocate, however, I felt that many parts of the book were misleading. Perhaps one of the faults is it tries to be too ambitious and attempts to cover too many topics, which often are not in depth enough to be of much value.

Dr. Snyderman points out correctly multiple times that the path to good health is through prevention by adopting healthy habits, staying physically active, and maintaining a sensible weight. The structure of the book reflects this preventive focus and chooses to debunk many myths with these clever chapter titles - Annual Checkups Are Obsolete, Vaccinations Are Just For Kids, Doctor's Don't Play Favorites, Only Old People Get Heart Disease and Stroke, We're Losing the War on Cancer, Natural Means "Safe", and You Can Just Snap Out of Mental Illness. She tackles the truth about herbal and dietary supplements, the unproven value of full body scans, as well as the importance of vaccinations and preventive screening tests for cancer, heart disease, and diabetes.

Throughout the book there are plenty of truth tidbits including, "you cannot catch sexually transmitted diseases from toilet seats; you do not need to drink eight glasses of water every day", among many others and news you can use segments that will make some readers hopefully more aware of what is myth and what is fact. These small sidebars were very interesting. I think patients and consumers will find these factoids topics of conversation.

As a practicing doctor, however, there are many areas which are misleading and others that provide information too superficial to be of value. Dr. Snyderman is correct in one of her chapters that heart disease and stroke are the leading causes of death in this country. However, she uses two individuals, a twenty-six year old former beauty pageant winner, who suffered from a stroke, and a forty year old woman, who died suddenly from swimming, as reasons why we should be concerned. The problem is that these type of occurrences are extremely unlikely and rare for these age groups and gender. The typical cause of these problems, atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries didn't cause these cases. The former was most likely due to a heart wall septal defect or a blood clotting disorder, known as a hypercoagulable state. The latter was probably due to sudden cardiac death from a fatal arrhythmia, like ventricular fibrillation.

In the area of stroke, she talks about atrial fibrillation, a heart arrhythmia, as the leading cause of stroke. It is a cause, but this heart condition is typically found in patients over age 60 and far more common in people over 80 years old. She doesn't say that and one would naturally and wrongly assume based on the prior patient stories that it can happen at younger ages, which again is extremely unlikely.

Other areas that are covered superficially include when Dr. Snyderman discusses cancer and mental illness. She pushes for prevention as well as clarifies myths that still exist among the public. Unfortunately in the chapter on cancer, she also talks about various cancer treatments which isn't thorough enough and doesn't seem to fit in a book with this preventive theme. For the mental illness, one of the best written sections because of her personal experience, again the book is rather too ambitious and tries to cover anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder and the various treatment options even as she admits that "it is impossible to go into as much detail as I would like to". Though she gives a website reference, perhaps it may have been better only to cover depression as she and her husband both had experienced it, and acknowledge the other conditions.

Overall, I wanted to like this book as I believe the intent of giving the public the facts about what they can do to stay healthy and well is vital. I think as a practicing doctor and insider, however, the book at times it is misleading, in some areas is too light in content and in others the information deviates from the book's intent of wellness and health promotion.

There are three reasons i did not like this book. 1) It was primarily female oriented. 2) It was biased toward a very light medical establishment viewpoint. For instance, it lists a number of possible adverse events related to supplements, but no such list for establishment substances such as estrogen and heart disease, the dangers of Celebrex, brain fog from cholesterol drugs and bypass surgery, etc. 3)It contains contradictory information. In Myth 5, she states that "Men should not take supplemental calcium, since some research suggests that excessive calcium may increase the risk for prostate concerns", whatever that may mean. Later in Myth 6 she states that "I am comfortable with calcium: 500 to 1500 millligrams daily depending on your age and quality of your diet." meaning what? If you look at ehese quotes, you will note that they are heavily weasel worded and not at all specific, as is the case with the whole book.

Medical Myths that Can Kill You: And the 101 Truths that Will Save, Extend, and Improve Your Life, by Dr. Nancy Snyderman, is a highly informative and helpful book.

And many of the myths she uncovers as false made me quite happy!

The book is divided into seven chapters that are the myths:
* Annual checkups are obsolete
* Vaccinations are just for kids
* Doctors don't play favorites
* Only old people get heart disease and strokes
* We're losing the war on cancer
* Natural means safe
* You can snap out of mental illness

The following will give you a good feel for what the entire book is like:

* There is a chart for men and women advising how frequently and at what age they should take medical tests and screenings.

* You do not need to drink 8 glasses of water a day. Coffee does count as a drink, debunking the myth that as a diuretic it doesn't count.

* You can't catch a cold from being in cold weather. (I KNEW it!)

* Cracking your knuckles does not cause arthritis.

* Your heart does not stop beating when you sneeze.

* It's better to be fit than thin.

* Fat-free foods can wreck your diet.

* Headaches are rarely a sign of a brain tumor.

* 1-3 cups of coffee a day helps retain memory. (A personal favorite!)

* Chart of common herb-drug interactions

* Boring jobs can kill you

* Happiness is a state of health.

I did not agree with the statement that antiperspirants do not cause breast cancer, however. Snyderman claims that research done by the National Cancer Institute and the US Food and Drug Administration have no evidence that they cause cancer.The lack of evidence from these groups does not convince me that antiperspirants are safe. This is not the space to debate the safeness or lack thereof of antiperspirants, but there is ample research that suggests using a natural deodorant is a far safer and prudent choice.

Overall, a very good book.

By the author of the award winning book, Harmonious Environment: Beautify, Detoxify and Energize Your Life, Your Home and Your Planet.

I really enjoy watching Dr Snyderman on the Today show most mornings. When she's on, she's very clued in and knowledgable. She has a great presence and I imagine a very good bedside manner.
In here she breaks down many myths that are out there and sets things straight. She says that in the computer age, many people have become "cyberchondriacs" and that we then diagnose ourselves with false information and only half-truths. She talks to the reader in a very personal and friendly way and makes you feel like you are in her office getting the best advice possible. This book runs right through so many various medical topics and that's what makes it so interesting. She talks about vaccines and how Dr's 'play favourites' and about how much water we REALLY need, and apsrin for heart attacks etc.
Because we are all human (obviously), there isn't one person this book wouldn't pertain to. It's fantastic, interesting and very helpful in dispelling old wives tales and helping you work out what's factual. I love it.

I think this book was well written, but like so many other medical informative books, it's just one opinion against another. Each side has all the proof necessary to make the statements, but the bottom line is: one side is not being truthful. So , it's still WHO you want to believe. I'm sorry I purchased this book, I should have known better.

Nancy Snyderman's book perpetuates as many myths as it debunks. Her section on vaccines comes straight from the CDC without question or thought. It's all fine if 80 year olds need a vaccine for the flu, but why do healthy 30 year olds? The flu vaccine has been shown to cause a number of problems including a proven link to Guillain-Barre Syndrome. The CDC does not communicate this knowledge to the public as the government has to purchase all unused flu shots at the end of the season. Snyderman's reiteration of the CDC position is a danger to those who might be allergic to any of the chemicals in the vaccines and is definitely a medical myth that can kill you.

It is refreshing to have someone in the medical community use common sense! Good book, easy reading, and great information.

Dr. Nancy Snyderman's straightforward, warm style seen regularly on NBC's Today Show, translates well to the pages of this book, where she debunks several urban legends regarding human health and wellbeing. She covers topics from whether or not one can contract a SDS from a toilet seat (you CAN'T) to an issue close to my heart, that the words "All Natural" don't imply a product is safe. "Tobacco, for example, is a natural substance," and for that matter, so is rattlesnake venom.

This book is good for the household reference library, and a great conversation starter as well. It's both informative and entertaining--just like Nancy Snyderman. It's not the be all and end all of medical diagnoses, however, and readers should be cautioned, as always, to consult with their own physicians.

Michele Cozzens, Author of A Line Between Friends and The Things I Wish I'd Said.

Glanced through this at the library... I'm not sure how anyone
who recommends Dean Ornish's high carbohydrate, super low fat diet
as healthy should be preaching to anyone... Wait, this is the
same low fat diet, low dietary cholesterol, high transfat diet
that our government and the AHA have been promoting.

I guess that's why we have a skyrocketing diabetes and heart
disease epidemic.

Far too much misguided info about getting "high cholesterol" levels
under control despite far too many studies debunking this.

More tripe and misleading info from the medical establishment.

Not sure if she's dispelling myths or creating them based on her assertion that Hepatitis C is spread through sexual activity. (She spends an astounding one sentence on the disease that infects nearly 4 million people in the US alone - and that sentence is erroneous.) The truth is that sex is rarely the cause of transmission. No mention of the fact that HCV is blood born and most commonly spread through drug use or transfusions. Quite a glaring oversight. Are we even sure she's a doctor?