Women's Health Books

I was so pleased to get this book so quickly. I had looked other places for it to see if I could beat the price as it is a required text for one of my classes. The seller was great in communicating with me and delivered the product in the condition it was promised.

Back in 1970, wading through a mire of academic prose in graduate school, I was dazzled by my discovery of Nancy Milio's new book, "9226 Kercheval." Not only was the author a nurse (like me), she was working in the community (like me). Better still, she wasn't pontificating or theorizing. In her own voice, she told the story of how she worked with residents of a restless, inner-city neighborhood just coming to grips with the potential of black power, to start a health center for women and children. It was hard slogging, but worth it in the end. I never would have guessed that, ten years later, I'd be engaged in a similar undertaking, albeit in very different circumstances--and writing about it. A couple of years ago, I begged a friend for her precious copy of the original hardback edition and reread it. It still elicited a "Wow!" Now I've got my own copy. I hope all of you reading this will consider doing the same.

I never fully understood the mystery of pap smears, and I was never really sure that I could trust the results (happily, always negative). This book fleshed out my understanding of paps, and answered the many questions I have had about them but never could quite articulate to my doctor. Further, little did I realize the significant link between sexually transmitted viruses and diseases and their potential, long-term effects until I read this book. I am much better informed now.

This book is for every woman.

Pap smears detect cervical cancer but there's a major difference between different types of abnormal pap smears, from full-blown cancers to results which are atypical yet benign. Abnormal Pap Smears not only helps consumers understand the differences; it also suggests lifestyle changes to reduce the risks of precancers and cancers.

Knowledgeably written by Gayle Reichler (a registered dietitian, professional chef, and certified nutritionist known as "America's Wellness Coach"), Active Wellness: Feel Good For Life: A Personalized 7-Step Program For Your Body, Mind And Spirit offers seven basic steps including eating and exercise plans designed to effectively change unhealthy habits and create a successful celebration and long-term maintenance of good health. Individual chapters refer to metal preparation, forming new habits and avoiding old triggers, creating a personal physical fitness plan tailored to one's needs, managing stress, maintaining one's health for a lifetime, and much more, Active Wellness: Feel Good For Life is an upbeat, can-do guide written especially for non-specialist general readers having trouble getting started or sticking to a schedule for improving their health and physical well being.

I am so glad to have discovered Gayle Reichler's ACTIVE WELLNESS! Not only does it offer helpful and accessible information on adopting a more healthy lifestyle, but the author's guidance is made all the more powerful by the fact that she followed the very same program herself. I have put my entire family on the Active Wellness Program - even my children. We have all struggled with our weight at one time or another, but since starting the program we have all lost weight and kept it off! We feel more energetic than ever. ACTIVE WELLNESS is a book for everyone concerned with getting and staying healthy. And we can all use a bit of help in that department!

Reading The Adventures of Swamp Woman is like being invited over for tea and sympathy by a friend who is walking the menopausal path with you.

Ferida Wolff bares her soul and reveals the deep fears many of her menopausal sisters share. When life passages suddenly seem to spin out of control without aid of our youthful hormones, this book brings comfort and reassurance. It lets us know we are not alone. A good thing, indeed, at any stage of life.

Many thanks to Ferida Wolff for this soothing cup of tea.

Every once in a while a book comes along that seems to see my perspective so clearly that I say, "That's it, that's what I feel, too!" Ms. Wolff has written just such a book. In her remarkable book, The Adventures of Swamp Woman, Ms. Wolff describes the thoughts and feelings of women going through menopause and so many of the rites of passage that occur simultaneously with it: changes in our relationship with our husbands, children growing up and leaving home, the death of a parent and many others. Her essays are so perceptive and rich in personal references it is as if she has created a map for us. That is, she says I have been there, too, and it's OK, you will find your way out. It is easy to identify with Ms. Wolff's feelings and experiences and as we do, we realize that what we are going through is not unique but something we share with most women; we just didn't know how to put it in words. Ms. Wolff has given us a voice and I thank her for it.

Claire Laufman

This is not only a book about Africian American Women's Health, but it is also an excellent guide to good health in general. While I am not an African American Woman, I have found this a useful guide for healthy living. I recommend it to ALL women. Dr. Alcena's writing is clear, concise and unlike many other similar books written by doctors, it is easy to understand. I refer to this book often.

The African American Woman's Health Book provides an excellent guide to the prevention and cure of illness, examining the factors which predispose black women to hypertension and including chapters on sickle cell anemia and other conditions which especially affect Afro-American women. An excellent, specific source guide results.

This book is about the destructive power of Alzheimer's Disease: it is also about love, endurance and experimental surgery that worked.

Bernie Weiss had been a brilliant engineer. When, after years of vaguely erratic behaviour, he failed a simple mathematical test, his wife Betty knew something was wrong. Five years later, as the disease advances in `text book' stages, Betty, who looks after him 24/7, is at breaking point: Bernie enters a care home. Two months later he is committed to a lock-up facility for violent behaviour. Betty visits and sees him `tied into a wheelchair, wearing a diaper ....he whispered: `take me home.''

Weiss continues to research treatment. By chance she reads of an operation that can increase blood flow to the brain. She tracks down reporter, then surgeon. Convinced that this is the only hope, she takes her husband to Germany where he becomes the third person to undergo the operation.

Weiss does not claim cure but the worst Alzheimer symptoms are reversed, like `a movie run backwards.' Her husband lives a further four and a half years, three of those at home, before `a gentle death.'

Weiss confides her own emotional and physical marathon in the chatty style of a diarist: if she is over-effusive she never indulges self-pity. The `intimate portrait' spares nothing of the indignity, humiliation, and terror of Alzheimer's. She is a good observer of friends, caregivers, doctors.

The story might have ended with Bernie's death. It doesn't. For Weiss, there is another hero: the pioneering surgeon. In trying to publicize the operation she meets only resistance from both media and medical establishment.

Weiss raises some important questions. Many will be helped by this book, some will be angered. It deserves a wide audience.

This forthright book is profound. It is important for anyone involved with or concerned about central nervous system disease; Alzheimer's and other brain syndromes.

One might not think a personal description of just one case of Alzheimer's disease would grab the attention of an overworked, middle-age internal medicine specialist.

But it does.

This detailed memoir has recharged and increased my empathy for my patient's with cognitive deficits and their care givers.

It will perk your interest in non-pharmacologic alternative treatments that may be crucial and have been overlooked.

This book is a courageous gift from the author who shares the continuous experience of caring for one's spouse through this illness.

Though this may not have been the intent, this portrait also demonstrates and teaches patient advocacy at the highest level;-provided by the author for her husband.

Thank you

This book not only gives you recipes, but the information you need to customize your own creations. Covers skin types, carrier oils, herbs, essential oils and facial massage techniques. Great information and results!

In ten minutes with the use of a blender, anyone can whip up skin-replenishing recipes using just a few natural ingredients from the market and Pierre Jean Cousin's Anti-Wrinkle Treatments For Perfect Skin. Over forty recipes for masks, cleansers, and lotions use fruit and herbs and provide excellent formulas for treatment.

We've been giving Véronique Vienne's "Art of..." books as presents for a lot of occasions, but this one's our new favorite: we like it because it's perfect for both the future mother AND father; fathers are given their due in this book! (which must be unique in books about pregnancy). The text is Vienne's usual funny, apt, sometimes surprising advice; and the pictures are better than ever: there's one of two little girls dancing which is worth the price of the book; another, of a kids' party, shows one child watching on as another seems to be doing the twist--the look on the face of the first is enough to make anyone want to go out and make babies. So, if your kids aren't getting around to propagating as fast as you'd like, perhaps you should give them this book now. Who says you have to wait till someone gets pregnant?

I found this book to be both entertaining and inspiring. This book is NOT a scientific textbook on birth and childhood. Instead, it tries to convey what it's like to be a parent from an emotional point of view. It's all about bonding with your child and being there for her. It's a fun book but also wise. I'd recommend this as a present for friends' baby showers--particularly if your friend is really stressed out by the thought of becoming a mom!

This book is well researched and well written. It even contains recipes. As I am in a research and reenactment group, this has been a godsend. I am delighted with the professionalism of this book. I have to be careful every time I open it that I don't drool on it. GREAT BOOK!!

While there are many books out on cosmetics, perfumes, and the history of adornment, there has been a dearth of well-researched, modern historical and archaeological studies with practical information. Sally Pointer, from the National Museum and Gallery of Wales, has written a text that fills that gap admirably. The depth and accuracy of the research, and the scholarly discussion, in The Artifice of Beauty, is combined with the re-creation experiences of a skilled museum curator.

Anyone interested in researching and/or recreating fashion, material culture, or personal life in history should have this book in her or his library. Those interested in homemade cosmetics and perfumes will also find it very useful.

Pointer first lays out "The Nature of the Evidence" in her introduction, then tackles the various ages of humankind in nine chronological chapters. While none is completely exhaustive-- the beauty regimens of the nineteenth century alone have filled multiple shelves of books-- each chapter provides a good groundwork for understanding cosmetics, perfumes, and ideas of beauty in the period. Her strongest suit is in the early evidence, Ancient World and Classical world sections, but those areas have previously been the subject of much archaeology but little reliable summary. Her information about the medieval through the seventeenth centuries is a treasure trove of facts and quotations.

Of special interest is Pointer's analyses of possible make-up trends based on pictoral representations of people in the period. Were pink cheeks admired? Highly accented eyes? What color of hair was in fashion. Information about hairpieces and false hair, washes, soap and other cosmetic preparations are also included. Sidebars cover specific items that Pointer herself has researched and recreated, such as a nail stain made from alkanet root, Roman wigs, Mesopotamian eye paints, alcohol-based Hungary Water, seventeenth century 'invisible rouge,' 18th century Carmelite water. Illustrations of advertisements highlight the later chapters. The text here is interesting as well as erudite, and Pointer carefully delineates her deductions and suppositions so that the reader can tell what is documented fact and what scholarly reasoning. Throughout, attention is paid to the safety of the ingredients discussed, and the possible and documented health effects on their users. Some facts-- such as a strange fashion in the nineteenth century for nipple-piercing and a selection of medieval mouthwashes-- will surprise the reader. Others, such as the utility of pomade for the hair, that the skin-destroying properties of ceruse (white lead) were known to the historic critics of 'painting', or that bathing and washing were done with some regularity in pre-modern periods, may explode some cherished myths.

After the text history, Pointer lays out "A Guide to Recreating Perfumes and Cosmetics, with Selected Recipes Adapted for Modern Use." The second section of the book is of interest not only to historians and re-enactors but to chemists, in that it consists of a glossary of cosmetic and perfume ingredients. While not exhaustive, especially with reference to more modern ingredients, this guide will be invaluable to those curious about Behen oil, Kohl, the elusive Nard, pomades, stacte, terebinth resin, etc. Here, also, are included a number of excellent recreated or redacted recipes. The next section covers Tools, Implements and Cosmetic Containers, with special attention to the pre-modern period.

One cannot overemphasize the importance of chapter 12, on Adapting Early Recipes to Modern Usage, for the recreator, re-enactor, or cosmetics student or dabbler. In this section Pointer lays out two historical recipes, one classical and one Victorian, and shows how she worked out safe, modern recipes for the items described. (For SCA purposes, these two recipes would be excellent guides for creating competitive documentation.) The painstaking work here, and the careful explanation of what changes and compromises the author felt necessary, are outstanding. This is supplemented by a table of Modern Cosmetic Pigments to assist the re-creator, a listing of Weights and Measures, as well as an Appendix listing ingredients mentioned by Classical Authors (compare to Forbes' Studies in Ancient Technology volume 3) and "Abdeker's Library of the Toilet, 1754." The index, notes and bibliography are easy to read and useful.

I highly recommend this text for personal and library collections. Libraries with an interest in personal care, women's history, cosmetic chemistry, fashion, pre-modern culture, hobby herbalism, and historic costume and medieval culture will find this an especially helpful introduction.

Life has these ironies.....your get the test results back, you dont know fear as this before. You go to the bookstore, the libary, anything to find comfort. The nights alone, ahead, you must find comfort, instead of fear. Michael Bokulich, boy of my childhood dreams. He's medical writer, father of four, lives in outside Philadelphia....and the book you buy, he is one of the authors. I"m okay, i fight things hard, "cuz life is worth living. You had some hand and thought to comfort me during my brush with fear. Thanks Michael. You do good work. Arlean Chicovic-Christman

The authors provide very clear, concise explanations of different types of breast cancer and treatment options for each. This seems like a very good introduction for anyone trying to learn more about this disease.