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307 of 359 people found the following review helpful:
Restore your energy naturally
I was privileged to be one of the participants who was chosen to undergo the Ultramind solution for six weeks prior to publication. Although it has only been 18 days since I started, the change in my energy level and my ability to concentrate is remarkable.
I have been suffering from intense fatigue and trouble concentrating for the last two years, and my...
Published 20 months ago by Sherril Stinnett
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595 of 749 people found the following review helpful:
not good advice
Hyman recommends the use of methyl-donating vitamins and says that methylation is the key to all chronic diseases. He calls it riding the methylation train. But I'm not so sure that is safe. An article in Scientific American Mind (June July 2008) on how methylation effects our genes says that methylation is associated with gene silencing of the corticosterone receptor,...
Published 19 months ago by Kathy
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307 of 359 people found the following review helpful:
Restore your energy naturally, December 18, 2008
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
I was privileged to be one of the participants who was chosen to undergo the Ultramind solution for six weeks prior to publication. Although it has only been 18 days since I started, the change in my energy level and my ability to concentrate is remarkable.
I have been suffering from intense fatigue and trouble concentrating for the last two years, and my physicians have been unable to find a medical diagnosis for my symptoms. Being a 46-year-old graduate student, wife, mother and employee, I have to be able to concentrate for long periods of time, especially in the evenings after work. Before the Ultramind solution, I could not concentrate or stay focused past the early morning. Without knowing exactly when it occurred, I now find that my energy has been restored enough so that I can work twelve hour shifts at the hospital without fatigue and still go home and study, while retaining what I read. As a side effect, I have lost close to ten pounds without ever going hungry.
Although it may sound totally impossible to remove all processed foods, sugar, dairy, trans fat, wheat and flour products as Dr. Hyman required from my diet, I have discovered that all of my prior sugar cravings have disappeared completely, even now during the hoiday season when cookies and candy abound. I snack on nuts and fruit and make sure I eat good proteins and plenty of fresh vegetables and I drink plenty of water.
In the beginning I thought I would never be able to make it six weeks, but three weeks have breezed by. I am definitely going to make the Ultramind Solution a way of life from now on. Dr. Hyman's principles are simple yet effective.
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167 of 194 people found the following review helpful:
What Most Doctors (including ME) Were Never Taught, March 9, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
One of my guiding principles has always been: Never read a book that has the word "ultra" in the title.
However, interesting perspectives on diet & health intrigue me, & when I saw endorsements from such respected doctors as Dean Ornish, Christiane Northrup & Mehmet Oz, I decided to break my rule and plunge into The UltraMind Solution.
I'm glad I did, for this book is an engaging read that's full of cutting edge science & practical advice. Dr. Mark Hyman has been on a mission to do medicine & health differently since conventional medical thinking failed him in his own debilitating illness twelve years ago. He convincingly argues that maintaining the body's health is essential for the brain's well-being, and that many mental & psychological disorders can be rooted in physical, biochemical derangements in the body's health & metabolism.
In part one of the book he details the background: his personal story which led to his changed philosophy & practice of medicine. He is an advocate of what is termed functional medicine, a relatively new discipline which focuses on not the established "label the disease, give it a drug" approach but "find what's functionally wrong behind the patient's symptoms, then correct the body's metabolism back to optimum function."
The second part of the book contain the outline of his "Seven Keys to UltraWellness" (argh! there's that word again!). He covers optimizing nutrition, balancing hormones, reducing inflammation throughout the body, fixing digestive tract problems, enhancing the body's detoxification, boosting energy metabolism, & calming the mind itself. The third part of the book covers a six week plan to initiate many of these changes, while the fourth part goes into specifics for each of his seven key areas.
Ok, so what's the bottom line? There's a lot of intriguing information and sound advice in the 400+ pages, & I saw nothing that I absolutely disagreed with. Like any diet or health book, he has his own viewpoint & focus, & some of his strategies & recommendations will work better for some than others. This book was a major swing factor in my own decision to try a vegan gluten free caffeine free water only lifestyle, which was difficult but very beneficial for me in multiple areas. I can see this book being useful for two groups of people: First, people who are suffering from problems such as anxiety, depression, "brain fog", adhd, migraines or other brain related problems might find something helpful or even life-changing in his plan. Other people, like myself, who are interested in new approaches & optimum health will certainly find new concepts & tools that they can implement in their own healthy lifestyle. Either way, an excellent book to read.
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42 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
Highly Recommended, January 10, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
I highly suggest this book as your next reading. I assure that for many of you it will be eye-opening. For example the information about sugar. -- You will learn that it is nothing else but a sweet tasting poison. Not only it can be responsible for diabetes but also for many other ailments, including dementia and/or Alzheimer's disease. Similarly problematic is cow's milk...
The most common effects of stressful life and diet containing sugars and highly processed foods are autism, Parkinson's disease, attention-deficit disorders, and chronic fatigue -- just to name a few. Conventional treatments of these and other diseases are usually dealing with the symptoms rather then underlying problem and as a result they don't help, or just provide slight benefits. Mark Hyman suggests natural solutions to these diseases of a "broken brains". The solution is to correct imbalances in the brain. These are the imbalances created by toxins, infections, excessive stress, and most importantly by nutritional deficiencies. By changing your lifestyle you can correct these imbalances and bring back your health without drugs or psychotherapy. So get this book and read about the steps to improving your health and bringing your broken brain back to normal. For more reading on the subject of `Body Cleansing' and `Health without Medication' I highly recommend Your Body Maintenance Handbook.
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595 of 749 people found the following review helpful:
not good advice, February 3, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
Hyman recommends the use of methyl-donating vitamins and says that methylation is the key to all chronic diseases. He calls it riding the methylation train. But I'm not so sure that is safe. An article in Scientific American Mind (June July 2008) on how methylation effects our genes says that methylation is associated with gene silencing of the corticosterone receptor, and silencing of genes that regulate hippocampal brain derived neurotrophic factor. The increase in methylation was associated with impaired stress response and depression.
I'm not sure that this Hyman is on the right track with his methylation train. Methylation is also linked with promoting cancer and researchers are looking for substances that demethylate the genes. Also M Szyf has shown hypermethylated genes in suicidal patients.
Methylation is not a panacea, nor is it necessarily always good for our genes. Methyl donating vitamins like folate and B6, which Hyman recommends, do lower homocysteine, but if you do not eat a lot of animal protein, you won't have elevated levels of this toxic chemical to begin with.
Also, eating seaweed (which Hyman suggests) may actually be bad for those with hypothyroid, according to researchers in Japan who were able to reverse hypothyroidism by restricting iodine to 100 mcg a day. Seaweed like kelp and bladderwrack is very high in iodine.
I thought the comments about potatoes being destructive to the brain were pure fiction. There is a book called Potatoes Not Prozac that talks about how important carbs are for tryptophan to enter the brain where it is synthesized into serotonin. It's based on J Wurtman's research. Wurtman says that even small amounts of protein or fat will interfere with the ability of carbohydrates to get tryptophan into the brain.
Missing from the list of foods that cause an immune reaction in the gut are beef and pork. These are prominent in leaky gut or as he puts it leaky brain. S Zar showed that IgG antibodies to beef and pork are the most prevalent and consistent food allergens for all types of IBS.
One of the primary ways to ward off diseases goes unmentioned, but not without the author letting us know he knows about it, but won't tell us. It's very weird. The way Hyman writes about The China Study, he makes it sound like some people need animal protein, even thrive on it, but in fact the whole point of that huge study was that not only do we NOT need animal protein, but that even modest amounts of it are associated with all of our western diseases of affluence, from heart disease, to cancer, osteoporosis, and diabetes; it's a long list.
I ate the way Hyman suggests for years and it did not work. It wasn't until I found The McDougall Program that I started to understand how to use food to get healthy and stay healthy. Plus you don't have to figure out all the supplements because you get all your nutrients from your food, which is the best way to take vitamins and minerals. It is simple, effective, and very inexpensive. I would recommend any of Dr John McDougall's books on the subject.
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36 of 43 people found the following review helpful:
Kevin Trudeau with an M.D., June 11, 2010
"A valuable brain tonic, and a cure for all nervous affections -- sick head-ache, neuralgia, hysteria, melancholy." - 19th century advert
To be honest, it was hard to give this book only 1 star, because so much of it contains sensible, good advice: eat organic whole foods, especially lots of vegetables, exercise, and learn to relax. How can you not like it, even if most of us have heard this advice many times before?
Well, it's the conclusions that Mark Hyman draws from his patients' experiences, (and to be fair, from various reputable studies), which he then implies is true for anyone suffering from depression or anxiety, or even autism, that makes this book stink of quackery.
Don't get me wrong: I do believe that common sense advice such as exercise and a good diet can help with mild to moderate anxiety and depression that is situational in nature (your sweetheart dumps you), or even perhaps a very small percentage of people who suffer from severe and chronic mental illnesses might be cured by fixing a vitamin deficiency or eliminating food allergies, but suggesting that this applies to ALL "broken brains" is irresponsible.
I unfortunately have suffered from moderate to severe anxiety/depression for most of my adult life (runs in the family). I have tried talk therapy (helped), exercise (helped), diet (helped somewhat) and vitamins and other "tonics and elixirs" (didn't do a thing) but the the hands-down winner was Paxil. That was a game changer. After all the hard work in therapy and the CAM wild goose chases, just a stupid little pill. It would be insulting if it didn't work so well.
Sadly, a book like the Ultramind Solution might keep sufferers from trying medication. For example, Mark Hyman writes: "Most patients who take antidepressants either don't respond or have only a partial response." (Kindle ed., p. 437)
Well, that's because some depression is situational, which is better treated with pyschotherapy, and to be fair, with some of the things Dr. Hyman espouses, like diet and exercise. Also, Mark Hyman has conveniently glossed over the fact that each antidepressant has a unique molecular structure, and hence will affect each person differently. Thus, while someone might do really well on an SSRI, another might have terrible side effects and ironically do better on an older tricyclic. This invariably makes antidepressants look less effective in clinical trails. In the future, if scientists are able to develop a genetic test which matches the sufferer's particular genetic makeup to the right antidepressant, then naturally, the non-placebo group will be even more responsive. The fact that Mark Hyman doesn't even bring this up shows how biased he is.
But according to Mark Hyman: "Conventional treatments don't help, make things worse, or provide only slight benefit...Just as brain problems all stem from the same root causes, they all have the same solution - The Ultramind Solution" (Kindle ed., p 284)
So fixing a severe brain problem, like say, schizophrenia, is really just a matter of eating more fresh fruits and vegetables, tracking down hidden food allergies and possibly chelating mercury? Almost seems too simple.
(Actually, all of this obsessing over what I eat and what poisons might be lurking in my body is giving me anxiety. And I think I may have a slight wheat intolerance, but a life without pizza and beer is too depressing. Oh shoot, a catch-22!)
Mark Hyman also states in the UltraMind Solution that "the foundation of modern psychiatry and neurology are based on myths"(Kindle ed. p 244), which puts him in the same company as noted mental health expert and actor Tom Cruise. When speaking of mental illness, he goes on to say "...they are ALL (emphasis his) really the same problem - imbalances in the seven keys to UltraWellness."(Kindle ed. p 284)
Wow, Mark Hyman has just cured all mental illnesses! Give the man a Nobel Prize!
Of course, you shouldn't take this reviewer's opinions or experiences too seriously, because they are based on personal anecdotal evidence. I could be just making this up, or perhaps I work for a pharmaceutical company, or for the same reasons that Mark Hyman shouldn't draw conclusions based on his own anecdotal evidence - because people's stories and perceptions are not scientifically reliable due to a host of issues, from the placebo effect to confirmation bias. That a licensed MD could disregard these facts so easily should give one pause.
Speaking of which, Dr. Steven Novella, noted neurologist and skeptic, had this to say about Mark Hyman on his blog, theness.com:
"What Hyman does is mix some cherry-picked scientific medical facts with pure speculation and misinformation, without distinguishing among them, and then presents them as cutting-edge medicine...He seamlessly mixes some reasonable statements with pure nonsense, and a misrepresentation of the evidence."
And, finally, there's the ultra-marketing and the ultra-self promotion that bothers me. You see, in addition to being all over the blogosphere (look everybody, I'm volunteering in Haiti!) and on youtube.com, Mark Hyman also sells the supplements he recommends in his book (to insure purity). As the Church Lady would say, "How conveeenient!"
Is Mark Hyman really Kevin Trudeau with an MD? Nah, this was just hyperbole on my part, a la Mark Hyman. I think Dr. Hyman is more the John Harvey Kellogg of our time - outgoing, charismatic, immensely pleased with himself - not a bad man, just ultra-misleading.
P.S. People who rant about pharmaceutical companies need to get some perspective. Yes, they are profit driven, and sometimes do naughty things. They shouldn't, for example, be allowed to advertise directly to the public, or fudge or exaggerate clinical trails (which even CAM studies are guilty of). But this also applies to the **for-profit** billion dollar supplement industry, which often makes questionable scientific claims, uses misleading marketing, and worse, has no regulatory oversight.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
UltraOverrated, August 23, 2010
In this book the author takes his rather narrow personal experience of fatigue and depression caused by mercury poisoning contracted while living in China and makes the broad assumption that if you're depressed you probably have mercury poisoning too; if not mercury poisoning then lead poisoning, or flouride in your water, or some other environmental toxin. As if to bolster his case he vaguely throws in some long-disproven theories of aluminum in antiperspirant being linked to Alzheimer's and breast cancer. While he does acknowledge briefly that there are other causes of depression, he then continues the rest of the book as if merucry poisoning is the only cause. Interestingly, as a cure for this he recommends chelation therapy, a controversial and dangerous practice which really has nothing to do with diet.
Like many authors with little information and a lot of pages to fill, he uses the technique of spending several chapters promising you all the wonderful things his 7 steps will do without actually telling you what those 7 steps are.
I did give this two stars because the diet is sound, but it's nothing new, and it's certainly not a cure for depression or anxiety. Limit sugar, eats lots of fruits and vegetables (preferably without added pesticides), keep your grains whole and your proteins lean.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
Biggest breakthrough in my 57 years of life, October 13, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
I have been on psych meds since 1984. This is a breakthrough. It makes sense. The book was reccomended by my family doctor who just happens to practice functional medicine. I am balancing my thyroid and testoserone and feeling much better. I was diagnosed with bi-polar and have had ECT with no help. I have gone to Recovery International meetings for the last 6 years. I have literally tried all the meds without a cure. This is a great book. I am already getting results and am off Zanax and only take 1/4 the Clonopin I used to.
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13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
Excellent, but beware....., February 13, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
This is an excellent book and an excellent program. However, my experience ordering Dr. Hyman's materials has been very disappointing. His customer service is unresponsive and unreliable. Just stay away from them, read his book, and you will get all you need.
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13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
Fantastic book for those who want to take control of their own health!, January 24, 2009
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
I read this book cover-to-cover within a few days of receiving it. I couldn't wait to get started on the program that he details in the book. I've now completed 2 weeks of the 6-week program and have noticed some improvements in various symptoms already, and have lost about 5 pounds so far! Dr. Hyman does a great job of walking you through some detailed physiology without being overly complex. If you have any symptoms relating to mind fog, depression, anxiety, low energy, etc., this book can really help you! If you're like me and have reservations about taking prescription medications, do yourself a favor and read this book first!
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
YOu can get all well, I did, like a miracle !!!!!!!!!!, February 9, 2010
This review is from: The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First (Hardcover)
Oh my, I have to share so you folks who are looking at buying this book will know it really works !!! I have been dealing with depression and thyroid troubles for ions and I started eating a raw food diet and within 2 months, I WAS HEALED. It was truly like a complete miracle. this really does work and it is not that hard !!! I lost my teaching job from having CFIDS and I lost almost everything, and after 15 years of CFIDS and being disabled, I started eating healthy, very healthy, I ate the Raw Food diet and within only 2 months , I was completely healed, It was truly nothing short of a miracle. Just yesterday I walked for 2 hours. Just in fall of 2009 ( it is now Feb 2010) Just last fall, I couldn't do anything. I couldn't even drive 26 miles to our big city. And now I can do ANYTHING ! and am doing it and I am off all my " head meds", EVen my thyroid kicked back on after 40 years, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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