Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Pages: 256
•
Trim: 6 x 9
978-1-4422-0729-5 • Paperback • May 2012 • $16.95 • (£12.99)
978-1-4422-0730-1 • eBook • February 2011 • $59.50 • (£46.00)
Naheed Ali, M.D., has lectured at the Pennsylvania Institute of Technology. He has published more than 200 medically related articles for Suite 101 Media, Inc., an online magazine with more than 27 million visitors a month. Ali's articles (on politics, culture, and health) have been regularly featured on the home page of Worldpress.org, a topical news website boasting more than 300,000 readers monthly, and he has appeared as a health expert for Weight Watchers Magazine, MSN Health, AOL News, and others. He is the author of Are You Fit to Live?
PART ONE: DIABETES AT A GLANCE
1 Diabetes Explained
2 Types of Diabetes
PART TWO: GETTING TO KNOW DIABETES
3 Causes and Symptoms
4 Diagnosing Diabetes
5 Treatment of Diabetes
6 Juvenile Diabetes
PART THREE: OTHER MANIFESTATIONS
7 Diabetes and Mental Health
8 Diabetes and Heart Health
PART FOUR: DEALING WITH DIABETES
9 The Diabetic's Ultimate Diet
10 Pain Management for the Diabetic
11 The Healthy Diabetic: Staying Motivated
In this well-organized guidebook, physician Ali gives diabetics and their families understandable information about an increasingly common and ultimately debilitating disease. More than 23 million people suffer from diabetes in the U.S. alone. Ali expertly covers the causes, treatment, and early and later symptoms. (The first signs are excessive thirst, urination, and appetite. Later, people can suffer from erectile dysfunction, acne, headaches, and cramps.) Ali also explains the disease's mind-boggling alphabet-acronym soup: BMI, SMBG, DCCT, NP, DKA. Rather than blaming type 2 diabetics for sufferers' condition, which is often brought on by obesity, Ali tries to motivate them to exercise and lose weight. He also includes a thorough glossary (whoever heard of Goodpasture's syndrome?) and several pages with contact information for research groups, diabetes centers and clinics, and other resources. His advice isn't always earthshaking; learn portion size, keep a food diary, eat more fruits and vegetables, quit smoking. But it may be lifesaving.
— Booklist
Intended for a popular readership but remarkably comprehensive, this reference manual begins with the important distinction between the relatively rare Type I form of Diabetes (which mostly afflicts people at a young age and affects only 5 to 10% of diabetics) and the increasingly more common Type II, which is related to obesity, lifestyle, genetic predisposition and, in a small number of cases, pregnancy. Ali (Are You Fit to Live?) reviews signs of the disease, such as thirst, frequent urination, and fatigue; discusses a simple blood-sugar test that can be administered by a primary-care physician; and provides in-depth treatment options. Diet and exercise, he states, may lower blood sugar in early-stage Type II Diabetes sufficiently to prevent the need for insulin, but careful monitoring is stressed. An overview of different methods of administering medication is also included, and Ali reviews potential medical complications from failure to receive proper treatment, including the slowing of mental functions and a greater risk of heart attack. The author also gives advice on food: what to avoid, what to eat, and in what amounts. This guide will prove very useful for Diabetics and their families.
— Publishers Weekly