Don't Worry. Be Healthy!: How to Avoid Obsessing about Your Health

In this age of hyperbole and hype, nothing cuts to the quick like common sense. This straight-talking, sage guide to healthier living displays common sense in abundance, which helps explain why the author has been voted Boston's top primary-care physician, based on surveys conducted by Boston magazine. Upfront, Solomon defines the real subject of his book how to live well and, a bit later, identifies a major obstacle to that goal: 'Rather than enjoy life, we as a culture worry constantly about health and illness.' The fault lies not primarily with patients, he explains, but with a medical industry that has 'fostered a climate of obsessive concern about health, illness, suffering and insurability.' That established, Solomon explores just about every aspect of general health from diet to exercise to sore joints, fatigue, viral illnesses, digestive difficulties, aging, cancer and death with additional chapters on medicines, herbs and vitamins, and alternative therapies (he finds much merit in yoga, acupuncture, tai chi, even chiropractic). Invariably, Solomon's approach, illuminated by myriad case studies and personal experiences, manifests an avuncular wisdom that surprises for its very reasonableness (for example, while advising that the obese diet and exercise, he holds that 'it's high time for overweight people to stop feeling guilty about their weight'; instead, fat or not, they should enjoy their lives). Smart, iconoclastic, brimming with sound advice and good humor, this book is just what the patient ordered.