Child Health Books

All four of my kids were patients of Dr. Schiller and I couldn't have asked for a better pediatrician. This book was my "bible." My kids liked him so much that he finally had to tell them (at 18!) they had to go to another doctor...they were too old for a pediatrician!

This book is a must for parents...it really is a common sense approach to caring for young children.

I relied on this book while raising my eight children. I am saddened that it is not available for me to buy for my children to use while raising their children!

Working in medicine does not always prepare you to be a parent. Dr. Shiller's on target "tincture of time" remedies allows the child's immune system to kick in developing antibodies for optimal health. I highly recommend this and look forward to giving it for my grandchildren! Let me know when it is reprinted!

Doctor Shiller's common sense advice kept me calm through many bouts of illness with my three children. Now I'm buying it for them to use as they raise our grandchildren.

"Perhaps most important, we will provide tips on how to talk about the things that matter most to your parents. What do they value? Who is important to them? What do they want their lives to be like as they approach the final stretch of the road? If you understand the answers to these questions, you will better understand the choices they make about their healthcare." ~Linda Northlander and Kerstin McSteen

Linda Northlander and Kerstin McSteen deal with the very sensitive issue of discussing death and life-support treatments with your parents. Through this book, you can learn a great deal about medical terminology and the pros and cons of feeding tubes and orders like DNR and DNI, but may or may not be what your parents want. So, this book helps you and your parents decide what is best.

The chapters in this book include:

Planning a Discussion
Who's Who in Advance Care Planning
Healthcare Options
Opening the Discussion
Understanding Values and Goals
Assessing Decision-Making Ability
How to Talk with the Doctor
Completing a Healthcare Directive
Understanding Hospice Care
Kitchen Table Calamities

Grief support, hospice care and issues with honoring directives are also discussed. This book will be appreciated by caregivers and by the person who knows they will need to be making many of the main decisions in regards to healthcare for an elderly relative. While difficult to read about death, it does bring an understanding to the healthcare issues everyone faces at the end of life. You may also want to read this book if you are working on a Living Will/Advance Directive. The last time I was in a hospital one of the first things the nurse asked me was if I had a Living Will, so this book may be useful for more than end of life issues.

~The Rebecca Review

Linda Norlander has given my family a wonderful gift. Her book served as the catalyst for a candid family discussion that, given current medical technology, I strongly feel all children and parents should have. Highly recommended.

As a physician working in the palliative and hospice care arena, 'Choices' is a welcome resource and guidebook for facilitating conversations on what people want at the end of life.

This book provides excellent background on why these 'kitchen table discussions' need to take place, and, more importantly, how to engage loved ones in these conversations. The examples are real and I believe many readers will be able to identify and relate to them. In addition, there are numerous resources listed at the back of the book, so that obtaining appropriate forms for documenting your parent's wishes will not be an impediment.

Our elders talk about this topic among themselves frequently. Now is the time to bring those conversations out into the open.

If this practical book isn't enough to get people started, I'd like to see Norlander and McSteen take the next step and organize community workshops whereby participants can practice the converstations and become even more comfortable raising these issues with their parents and relatives.

Thank you Ms. Norlander and Ms. McSteen

The book is a remarkably lucid explanation of why and how you should discuss the end of life with family members. It is a combination of practical "how to" and "what is" information about the kinds of choices that have to be made with terminal illness with examples of how real people have faced these choices. It is written with a somewhat wry humor and great compassion, from the experience of the authors, who work in the hospice movement, their own families and friends. Based on the notion that difficult, personal issues should be discussed over a kitchen table (or wherever everyone is most comfortable), it is essential reading for anyone who has older parents or who themselves will become old (which means pretty much everyone who is an adult). Highly recommended.

Clara Barton proved that even shy people can do great things and overcome their fears. It is very inspirational! (I loved seeing my daughter reading for enjoyment!!)

I really liked this book because I really like to learn about different people. To know who Clara Barton is and what she did is very exciting. People who like reading about famous people and what they did would really like this book.

I ENJOY READING ABOUT HISTORY ...I THINK CLARA BARTON WAS A VERY BRAVE PERSON AND I WOULD LIKE TO WORK WITH THE RED CROSS SOME DAY AND HELP PEOPLE.

I enjoyed the book Clara Barton because it was a very inspiring book. Whenever she had a goal she would never give up on it. I thought it was very nice she would go all the way to the top just to help people and I think it's a great book for you to read!

Like Mr. Andrews, I have a bleeding disorder. We also share the sad distinction of having to be hospitalized for "bleeds". These are always terrible, trying times.
My god how I wished I'd had this book with me during my last bleed.
Andrews captures the experience perfectly. There is all the fear, the humor, the midnight pleas for more pain medicine, the frustration, the urge to get up and get back to your normal life. It's all there. And without a word wasted.
The loss of Tom Andrews was a tragic moment for poetry, but I will continue to honor his memory by buying as many copies as I can of Codeine Diary (as well as his wonderful poetry collections) and handing them out to everyone I know (especially my patients with bleeding disorders). I know that the world has much to gain from his wise words.

This novel is at times funny, at other times heartbreaking, but entirely wonderful. It is a shame that Tom Andrews passed away so soon after the publication of this, his first novel. He was a great writer and a family friend who will be missed.

As I read this I entered a world where only 20,000 others are forced to endure in the USA. That world being that of a Hemophiliac. We can never know what suffering is as Mr. Andrews does, but this book has shown us a shocking glimpse of what it's like. I have been awakened from my shallow existence and can now overcome what measly barriers life has given me. Mr. Andrews, thank you for sharing your life with us. I sir take my hat off to you for your courage and wish you nothing but the best of luck in the future! I must also conclude by saying that you are a damn good poet as well, but then again Charles Wright is your mentor. But please do me a favor from now on, try to live a sedentary life for you have much poetry left to write. It would be a shame to deny us of many more years of your wonderful poetry, by risking it all on some reckless adventure. Your life is your own, but remember that you also have a legion of loyal readers that you are now responsible for.

Andrews provides a glimpse inside the personal space of a poet who happens to be a hemophiliac. _Codeine Diary_ is a carefully wrought memoir that reveals Andrews' passion for language and life, and it is this love of language which makes this uniquely witty and introspective book more than personal. It is good that it was written.
- C.M.

This is a really great book which at some points will make you cry. It really touches the lives of children with cancer in great detail and brutal truth. I love how Dr. Lazarus touched on how he often gets comments from people about how "They could never do that", and how it is a tad offensive to him. I understand completely. I enjoyed the miracles' section also.

I am the mother of two children with disabilities. I do not have a child with cancer. However, when I picked up the book "Conquering Kids Cancer", I could not put it down. This book is not just for a family going through cancer, it's for any family. Dr. Lazarus makes a good source of information for anyone interested in learning more about cancer including anyone in the medical field. His down to earth writing makes this book a must have. It made me laugh and cry but most of all it made me appreciate life to the fullest.

Dr. Lazarus gives a good commentary on how medicine is more than just administering RX to patients. It goes so much furthur than that. Dr. Lazarus shares some heartwarming stories about his road in the pediatric oncology world. It also reveals why a doctor would choose this specialization. I for one am glad he did.

A great compassionate doctor reveals how medicine should be practiced

Goes way beyond blaming individuals for the horror of abuse, and holds the violent culture that abuse is embedded in accountable. Doesn't let individuals perpetrators off the hook, but is a window into the mechanism that produces them. Other people have addressed the topic of abuse and violence, but perhaps not as comprehensively as this book. Scary topic, but information and viewpoints needed to address this systemic illness.

By Dr. Ian Irvine, co-editor The Animist Creating Sanctuary is a powerful piece of writing by an almost extinct professional breed - the psychiatrist/psychologist prepared to examine the bigger picture in regards to the causes of psychic distress in modern Western societies. The book undoubtably belongs to a long tradition of humanistic and Freudian writings on mental illness as produced by modern Western social structures. The title itself recalls Fromm's book 'The Sane Society' and I would argue that in many ways Bloom has given us a powerful update on themes covered in that now classic work. One also thinks of works by Arthur Janov (especially his work on trauma suppression), Alice Miller, De Mauss, Mickel Adzema, Wilhelm Reich (and the Bioenergetic tradition), Stanislav Grof and many others who have applied Freudian and Humanistic ideas to the social arena. In this sense the work is also in a kind of refracted dialogue with that great Freudian text Civilisation and its Discontents. The picture of modern society - particularly modern American society - painted for us by Bloom is not a pretty one. Sanity and psychic health is seen as a virtual impossibility in the face of a normalised climate of repression and institutionalised trauma creation. The central obsessions of our consumeristic, violence and money obsessed modern world are described in terms of a general malaise polluting and undermining the psychic integrity of individuals and collectives alike. Bloom accurately describes to us a world characterised by institutional harshness, denial (that there even is a crisis!) and outright disinterest in the truly important issues to do with trauma and violence that now shape our collective social psyches. In this climate, psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers and other health care professionals seem all but unable to act in the best interests of their clients. In this sense, Bloom criticises the faceless bureacrats, lawyers and insurance moguls who increasingly shape and infringe upon the client patient relationship: often forcing psychiatrists to opt for functionalist alienated treatment regimes over potentially more humane and effective ones. The insight that society is not so much interested in curing people who have fallen victim to the collective (in)humanity we call a society, as in making money out of the later life effects of trauma suppression is a disturbing under-current to the book. There is a great deal to this book, far more than I could cover in a short review like this. The work is groundbreaking in its merged sociological and psychological methodology. More importantly, however, it stands as powerful indictment of the way in which modern societies act to undermine and subtly traumatise large sections of their populations. A must read.

I enjoyed this book tremendously. This is the most understandable and clearly written text I have ever read relating to the psychology field. There is no "psycho babble" here, folks. Anybody with an eighth grade education should be able to understand what the author is trying to say.

The author obviously believes in treating patients with tremendous dignity and respect. While this program is mainly inpatient focused to benefit those of us who are unfortunate enough to need more than a little help in carrying our life's baggage, as it were, reading this book makes very clear to me the way in which many situations I faced as a child effect my adult life that I have never really completely understood. The author says, in the most compassionate and definitive way, IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT! The author should be commended for her fine work and that of her team of obviously exceptional and gifted health care providers. The author must be one of the "real doctors" in todays environment, and they are darned hard to find.

A very moving account of the impact of violence on our lives and what it takes to create an environment where we can recover from our wounds. Dr. Bloom's call for a therapeutic approach to violence stands in stark contrast to popular proposals for meeting violence with more violence. In a violence-traumatized society, Creating Sanctuary belongs at the top of our social agenda.

Excerpt from the book:

I grew up with domestic violence and witnessed my mothers escape. As an adult, I lived with an abusive husband, leaving with my two children in 1996, our ninth departure. We first went to my sisters and slept on her floor. Through the assistance of a social service agency, I learned of a shelter but didn't think I would qualify because I wasn't visibly bruised like Mom, although I did feel her shame and worthlessness.

I remember my father kicking my mother in the stomach when she was six months pregnant. He gave her black eyes and broke her nose twice. He would beat my brother and me in front of each other and told us if we cried he would beat us more. Mom left Dad for the final time, taking her five children to Aunt Rene's where we joined a cousin and her children fleeing an abuser. Mom borrowed Aunt Rene's pistol, afraid of what Dad would do to us after his release from jail. When he came, Mom confronted him with the gun. He left, but I always wondered how our lives would have turned out if Mom had killed Dad that night.

At the time, my mothers only recourse was to live in the projects in Houston: her two sisters were married to abusive men and we couldn't stay with our grandparents because Grandpa had raped Mom as a child and she was afraid he would molest us, although he eventually did.

Without a diploma, Mom worked full-time at night and attended school full-time during the day. While my mother never sought any counseling, I had access to a shelter and its services: a court advocate to escort me to court, help in obtaining a protective order, an apartment with the anonymity required to prevent our abuser from stalking us as he always had, daycare for my children, and most importantly, help in locating psychiatric services to manage my depression and post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), as well as much-needed counseling for my daughters and myself. I'd left my abuser so many times before and always returned because of money and fear.

After eight consecutive departures and returns, I felt my daughters didn't deserve such a pathetic mother. I wasn't there for them emotionally of financially. I felt like such a
failure. I was ready to end my life.

It took years to fully recognize my abuse. I didn't know that besides physical abuse, domestic violence includes emotional abuse, sexual abuse, isolation, using the children, economic abuse, male privilege, coercion and threats. The shelter helped me gain control over my life. With their help I went back to school and I am now a graphic designer. For the first time I feel more important than my abusers and that I have a real chance to make it.

My mothers journey from domestic violence ended with my journey. My daughters won't repeat the cycle of abuse. That is the most precious gift anyone has ever given me.

------------

am a public speaker and have addressed audiences of over 500 regarding domestic violence, incest and child abuse. I've given a multi-media presentation at The Women's Museum, Dallas City Hall including Mayor Laura Miller and spoken to law students at SMU. I've appeared on Good Morning Texas and have been interviewed by media outlets in Austin, Texas where I testified before the Texas Senate regarding domestic violence.

The book consists of several short essays followed by poetry. I designed the cover and back (excluding misguided typography) and included my artwork.

Angela Hayden
ART GODDESS
http://www.cafepress.com/angelahayden

Ms. Hayden offers an opportunity for an empathetic journey through her own trauma and in doing so, bravely displays the hope she retained and ultimately seized in her triumph over physical and sexual abuse. Readers will gain an insight into the intergenerational component of abuse only offered by such a heartfelt and nearly stream-of-consciousness account.

In her book, Ms. Hayden does what few women dare to do. She tells the truth - both in prose and in poetry imbued with a raw, emotional honesty - about domestic violence and its effects on women's minds, sexuality, and families. In a culture where women's suffering and acquiescence to exclusively male sexual gratification remain the norm both inside of the bedroom and out, Dead Wrong dares to break the `feminine' silence. It is a rallying call to women who have been and are being victimized, and a must-read for anyone who seeks to know all facets of the reality of female existence in the contemporary western world.

This book is so real, so touching. It is walking through the anguish of abuse with the author.
I almost felt the pain as she told about her childhood. By the time she began to tell about her abusive husband, anger had set in. Then I was allowed to cheer when she discovered a way out and had the courage to take it.
I hope every person who has a daughter, sister, or other loved one in an abusive relationship will read this book. It will help them understand and, hopefully, stop them from asking the question, "Why didn't she just leave?"

A good heart is essential but not enough in rehabilitation work. This book thus gives readers the basic understanding of people with different kinds of disabilities, enabling us to work well with them. What's more, the numerous heartfelt photos show us that if we can get things right, people with disabilities can enjoy a joyful life.
What's more, the author is so kind that he even encourages readers to xerox the content if necessary provided that not everyone can afford buying a book.

I'm a pediatric physical therapist who works with many people from Mexico and Latin American countries. This book (I often use the spanish version, also on Amazon.com) contains very useful information that I can share with families to help them better understand their disabled child's conditions. It has many creative methods of building equipment for little to no money that are important in our days of managed care.

There are some conditions, like polio, that are uncommon here in America. However, some of my imigrent families have children that have had polio. I used this book to make up for gaps in my own training. In fact, I've learned something useful from almost any page. This book belongs in the car of any therapist, (PT, OT) or person who works with disabled imigrent children. I highly reccomend it.

As a former PCV in The West Indies, I used this book for ideas to share with families who had special needs children. It has many low cost alternatives to equipment that is often too costly for families without resources. The book also addresses the need for a handicapped child to do useful work in the family unit, something that is often forgotten. Self esteem can be taught if a child is given tasks, however small. I had to leave the book at the PeaceCorps Library when I left, and think that no Early Interventionist, OT or PT should be without a copy. A copy in Spanish and a copy in English would be a great asset.

I spoke with an Occupational therapist who says this book was like a bible to her when she did a fieldwork session in rural India~ It was highly recommended!

I found this book a practical and easy to use help in discovering my children's natural giftings and personality traits. It helps explain why their personality "quirks" are really evidences of their own God-given gifts. It helped me better understand them and accept them. I feel I can help guide them better as I understand them better. I can Cooperate with God in helping them live up to their potential, rather than my expectations.

This book is a great resource for parents. I intend to give copies as baby gifts to new parents, it's just that helpful. With it you will begin to understand your child's strengths, their weaknesses, those "little things they do" that exasperate you. Sometimes, I've learned from this book, that annoying habit is a key to their bent, their greatest strength. It will help you direct their interests, know how to discipline them better, understand their friendships, and communicate with them better.

I've found this book very helpful in determining my "gifts" as well as my seven year old son's "gifts." It describes him to a tee! It has been a wonderful tool especially in the area of schooling; it gives good insight into strengths and weaknesses, areas of interest, and why children may do certain things that don't always make sense to us as parents. It certainly gives me more patience when teaching my son as a homeschooler.

Better than their first effort, and easier to understand, this book explains some of the reason children behave the way they do and how to "train them up in the way *they* should go". Two little quibbles--spanking is not an effective method of *discipline* (discipline's root is disciple--you *don't* hit your students--at least I hope not) and their insistence on putting homosexuality and masturbation on a list of sexual sins. But those are things that can be ignored, and the rest of the book is very well done.

I do not have any children, but I found that this book had a lot of good advice for everyone, even adults.

This is a small paperback with very densely printed pages. It's not for those with poor eyesight, and it's not beautiful. But it's packed with information and advice to help a parent know what to do in a variety of situations and when to call the doctor. I have three small children, and the advice to me looks sound and sensible.

This is an excellent book for all mothers, especially new ones. Whilst it is not designed to be a substitute for a doctor's visit or opinion, it does give good guidelines for when to go to a doctor/emergency as well as, when and what you can do at home. I have found it particularly helpful when my daughter had croup, we knew what to do at home and were aware of signs that told us when an emergency visit was needed.

I've given copies of this book to all my relatives and many friends after their babies were born. The title is a bit misleading ... it's much more than home remedies and is not intended as a substitute for pediatricians. This well-organized book covers a broad range of potential concerns (from colds, behavior problems, discipline techniques, rashes, ticks, and allergies to more serious diseases) and ages (babies to teens), offering information that is easily understandable yet fairly comprehensive and to the point. It can help parents understand what's "normal" and specifies when a visit to a doctor is imperative/advisable. It's useful as a reference, allowing a parent to review the child's symptoms before a visit to the doctor and perhaps ask "better" questions (or provide "better" information) during the examination.