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Alternative Cures: The Most Effective Natural Home Remedies for 160 Health Problems
As the editor-in-chief of Prevention Magazine Health Books , Bill Gottlieb created the 10-million copy self-care bestseller, The Doctors Book of Home Remedies , and was the author of the 1.5 million copy alternative health bestseller, New Choices in Natural Healing . Now, Bill has once again created a groundbreaking booka book that can help anyone safely, successfully and naturally self-treat 160 everyday and serious health conditions: Alternative Cures . To write this unique book, Bill interviewed over 300 of America's top natural cliniciansdoctors, herbalists, nutritionists and more. You'll discover over 1000 of their most effective, practical and safest natural remedies for an A-to-Z of health problems, from arthritis, back pain and high cholesterol, to repetitive strain injury, weight gain and yeast infections. Plus, every chapter of Alternative Cures has a guide to the best alternative and conventional professional care for the condition it covers. And, you'll find essential safety information for every remedy featured in the book. Once you look at it, we think you'll agree: There's never been a more useful, reader-friendly, get-better book about alternative health and healing than Alternative Cures.
Hardcover
First published November 4, 2000
7 people are currently reading
210 people want to read
About the author
Bill Gottlieb
32 books10 followersBill Gottlieb has spent his lifetime learning about and writing about health—and helping millions of Americans achieve their health goals.
For 20 years (1976-1995), Bill worked at America’s leading health and wellness publisher, Rodale, Inc. He started as an associate editor of Prevention Magazine in 1976, and became a senior editor of Prevention in 1978 and assistant managing editor in 1980. In 1982, he was promoted to managing editor of Prevention Magazine Health Books, and in 1984 to executive editor. In 1986, he became editor-in-chief of Rodale Books, including Prevention Magazine Health Books. From 1986 to 1995, Bill was the editorial executive who helped lead Rodale Books from $100 million to $250 million in yearly sales, managing an editorial staff of 125 people, and supervising the publication of 75 books a year, including the mega-selling The Doctors Book of Home Remedies (16 million copies sold).
A longtime spiritual practitioner, Bill decided to leave Rodale in 1995 to become the volunteer publishing director of The Dawn Horse Press, the publication division of his spiritual community, Adidam.
For 20 years (1976-1995), Bill worked at America’s leading health and wellness publisher, Rodale, Inc. He started as an associate editor of Prevention Magazine in 1976, and became a senior editor of Prevention in 1978 and assistant managing editor in 1980. In 1982, he was promoted to managing editor of Prevention Magazine Health Books, and in 1984 to executive editor. In 1986, he became editor-in-chief of Rodale Books, including Prevention Magazine Health Books. From 1986 to 1995, Bill was the editorial executive who helped lead Rodale Books from $100 million to $250 million in yearly sales, managing an editorial staff of 125 people, and supervising the publication of 75 books a year, including the mega-selling The Doctors Book of Home Remedies (16 million copies sold).
A longtime spiritual practitioner, Bill decided to leave Rodale in 1995 to become the volunteer publishing director of The Dawn Horse Press, the publication division of his spiritual community, Adidam.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 10, 2012
I read this book after I saw it recommended by an Amazon reviewer. After reading it, I really couldn't imagine wanting to recommend this book to anyone myself, unfortunately.
For one thing the sections in the book were mainly geared towards minor conditions such as dry hair, warts, foot odour and so on. Where more serious diseases were mentioned, often very simplistic advice was given, perhaps one or two vitamin or herb recommendations and then advice on relaxation and visualisation exercises. Many important recommendations for diseases that are in just about every other book, were left out entirely making this book a very poor choice as a sole source of treatment advice.
Of course it may help if you have a simple condition and no knowledge at all of vitamin therapies and so on... but you are missing out by not getting the full picture you would with a better book that had more concrete medical information based on studies and facts. There are lots of them!
My second and much larger problem with the book was the huge focus on mumbo jumbo, not just any old sort but `blame the victim' mumbo jumbo. That books can just make such absurd and stupid statements and claims with no factual basis whatsoever is appalling. The claims made are like...more like fairytales than anything to do with science.
The milder side of this is where for example, visualisation exercises are recommended to get rid of warts. Mostly that is just silly, but it's probably not going to do you any harm...or any good!
But I think that for example where it is claimed that thyroid disorders can be caused by a person harming their throat chakra by `not speaking their mind and bottling up emotions and thoughts' is very different. That is incredibly offensive and could be harmful. Patients with thyroid disorders should not ever be blamed as causing them themselves through their personality or behaviour, or just as bad, told that changing their behaviour can change the condition. It's potentially harmful, and abusive.
I'm an advocate for people with M.E., most of whom have thyroid problems as part of the disease; a disease caused by a virus that can affect anyone. To imply that these (or anyone else's) thyroid problems could be caused by personality, or even that everyone with M.E. or thyroid problems has the same personality is silly in the extreme. (And some of us are very very big talkers!)
To help patients relax and meditate and reduce stress in their lives in order to promote healing is fine, but why sully this very good advice with fairytale nonsense that helps nobody and unfairly blames ill people for their predicament. In this day and age there is no excuse for it.
Relation techniques and mediation are wonderful things, its such a shame when they are tied to a dodgy new age `the mind causes most of the body's illnesses' agenda. An agenda that seems to be about people being able to feel superior to those that are ill, or safe from illness themselves due to their `superior' thinking style. It may also put people off these very important and scientifically valid therapies.
What I did like about the book were the imaginative sections on how to cope with grief and how to cope with nightmares. I thought these sections were very good and may even be quite helpful. The idea that nightmares were often positive as they were helping you to solve problems in your life, and that it can be a good idea to write them down and analyse them, and even to work out/imagine what you could have done, or made happen differently and how they could have ended more positively was good.
I was also relieved to find the section on `CFS' while stupid and factually incorrect, at least wouldn't be likely to cause harm as only very safe supplements were recommended (eg. CoQ10). As `CFS' is made up of those with many hundreds of different conditions it would be unlikely to get to the root cause of almost any of them either and can only delay proper diagnosis and treatment ('CFS' is always a misdiagnosis, a wastebasket diagnosis), but at least doing no harm is better than most books manage! It's a relief every time when exercise is NOT recommended, as this can ruin the lives of M.E. patients, many of whom are sadly misdiagnosed with `CFS.' Unfortunately Dr Teitelbaum provided this information, and any book which supports this problematic doctor and his generally misleading and harmful information on `CFS' does not inspire a lot of trust or respect.
Overall though, I couldn't recommend this book. I'd recommend `The vita-nutrient solution' and `Orthomolecular medicine for everyone' and `The optimum nutrition bible' instead, if you want the solid facts and more useable and thorough information, free of mumbo jumbo!
Jodi Bassett, The Hummingbirds' Foundation for Myalgic Encepahalomyelitis
For one thing the sections in the book were mainly geared towards minor conditions such as dry hair, warts, foot odour and so on. Where more serious diseases were mentioned, often very simplistic advice was given, perhaps one or two vitamin or herb recommendations and then advice on relaxation and visualisation exercises. Many important recommendations for diseases that are in just about every other book, were left out entirely making this book a very poor choice as a sole source of treatment advice.
Of course it may help if you have a simple condition and no knowledge at all of vitamin therapies and so on... but you are missing out by not getting the full picture you would with a better book that had more concrete medical information based on studies and facts. There are lots of them!
My second and much larger problem with the book was the huge focus on mumbo jumbo, not just any old sort but `blame the victim' mumbo jumbo. That books can just make such absurd and stupid statements and claims with no factual basis whatsoever is appalling. The claims made are like...more like fairytales than anything to do with science.
The milder side of this is where for example, visualisation exercises are recommended to get rid of warts. Mostly that is just silly, but it's probably not going to do you any harm...or any good!
But I think that for example where it is claimed that thyroid disorders can be caused by a person harming their throat chakra by `not speaking their mind and bottling up emotions and thoughts' is very different. That is incredibly offensive and could be harmful. Patients with thyroid disorders should not ever be blamed as causing them themselves through their personality or behaviour, or just as bad, told that changing their behaviour can change the condition. It's potentially harmful, and abusive.
I'm an advocate for people with M.E., most of whom have thyroid problems as part of the disease; a disease caused by a virus that can affect anyone. To imply that these (or anyone else's) thyroid problems could be caused by personality, or even that everyone with M.E. or thyroid problems has the same personality is silly in the extreme. (And some of us are very very big talkers!)
To help patients relax and meditate and reduce stress in their lives in order to promote healing is fine, but why sully this very good advice with fairytale nonsense that helps nobody and unfairly blames ill people for their predicament. In this day and age there is no excuse for it.
Relation techniques and mediation are wonderful things, its such a shame when they are tied to a dodgy new age `the mind causes most of the body's illnesses' agenda. An agenda that seems to be about people being able to feel superior to those that are ill, or safe from illness themselves due to their `superior' thinking style. It may also put people off these very important and scientifically valid therapies.
What I did like about the book were the imaginative sections on how to cope with grief and how to cope with nightmares. I thought these sections were very good and may even be quite helpful. The idea that nightmares were often positive as they were helping you to solve problems in your life, and that it can be a good idea to write them down and analyse them, and even to work out/imagine what you could have done, or made happen differently and how they could have ended more positively was good.
I was also relieved to find the section on `CFS' while stupid and factually incorrect, at least wouldn't be likely to cause harm as only very safe supplements were recommended (eg. CoQ10). As `CFS' is made up of those with many hundreds of different conditions it would be unlikely to get to the root cause of almost any of them either and can only delay proper diagnosis and treatment ('CFS' is always a misdiagnosis, a wastebasket diagnosis), but at least doing no harm is better than most books manage! It's a relief every time when exercise is NOT recommended, as this can ruin the lives of M.E. patients, many of whom are sadly misdiagnosed with `CFS.' Unfortunately Dr Teitelbaum provided this information, and any book which supports this problematic doctor and his generally misleading and harmful information on `CFS' does not inspire a lot of trust or respect.
Overall though, I couldn't recommend this book. I'd recommend `The vita-nutrient solution' and `Orthomolecular medicine for everyone' and `The optimum nutrition bible' instead, if you want the solid facts and more useable and thorough information, free of mumbo jumbo!
Jodi Bassett, The Hummingbirds' Foundation for Myalgic Encepahalomyelitis
December 30, 2008
very helpful remedy book alot of home remedies in it too straight from the garden the way i like it!!
June 23, 2011
A very good book if you want to get rid of existing chemical based therapies. A life time reference manual.
May 3, 2022
its a good book if you are looking for home remedies but it didnt have in it more complicated things just normal eveyday problems you can find on the internt free
January 3, 2016
This is a great little book to refer to for not so serious everyday life issues. mostly simple remedies that might keep you from having to go straight to a doctor for most minor issues. it also recommends some good vitamins and herbs to help reduce the severity of some issues or symptoms that you might be experiencing.
June 21, 2008
Because what healthy 20-something needs corporate medicine?
...I mean, seriously.
...I mean, seriously.
July 14, 2008
very interesting
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews