Textbook of Bio-identical Hormones
Textbook of Bio-Identical Hormones by Edward M. Lichten, M.D., F.A.C.S. The contents of this book are aimed principally to the general public and other health care professional.  We are in an era in which the general public has become activists for their own health care. Many means are now available, but the web has answered many requests, however, books are still the primary source for learning. I have produced 40 textbooks in Obstetrics and Gynecology and read thousands of manuscripts as Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, but none like this book by Dr. Lichten. I would like to identify this book as the book of the future as it is not like the standard textbook of today. It will energize your thinking and will make you ask many questions about the present and the future [of health care]. The book is divided into three logical parts with many subheadings. BOOK I: The Role of Natural Hormones involving the Pineal, Pituitary, Thyroid and Adrenal glands; BOOK II: The Role of Natural Estrogen for Women including Menopause, Ovaries, Progesterone, Testosterone, Menstrual Migraine and Osteoporosis; and BOOK III: The Role of Natural Testosterone for Men including Male-Andropause, Heart and Cardiovascular Disease, and Diabetes. Dr. Lichten says that the theme of this book is  The body can most often heal itself if supplied with the proper building blocks of vitamins, minerals, fats and especially bio-identical hormones.  We live in a time of too much information to evaluate from the newspapers, magazines, books, the Internet and your health care professionals.  How do you know what you read is totally true or partially true?  Your interpretation of this information makes it valuable or of no value at all. Dr. Lichten has used scientific methodology to help you understand his book. He has developed a generous scientific literature with multiple references that are both clinical and scientifically sound on each topic. This book is almost a medical autobiography of the past that he has encountered, as well as thought for the future. This book is not intended to be  evidence based medicine  as this only pertains to individual publications and not textbooks. This book also lays foundations for the future. First, people must believe that [health care] has viability [and that they are the co-pilot on their quest for good health].  The proof of the pudding can only come with time. Concepts, and precepts, and understanding do not come easy.  It takes cerebration, imagination and perseverance to make things happen. May you enjoy reading this book as I did. Frederick P. Zuspan, M.D. Chairman Emeritus Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology The Ohio State University School of Medicine and Public Health --Frederick P. Zuspan, M.D.; forewordHealth Care is Sacred Work. Health caring is sacred work.  Health caring begins with a decision to give of one s self so that another may begin the process of healing and recovery.  Health caring is a calling, a vocation.  The basis of health caring is love...love for others, even those difficult to love. Health caring is about continuously improving how we care for and about others. Continuously improving health caring begins with asking questions...questions about what we know, and perhaps more importantly about what we do not know.  This book is about asking those questions...as well as about moving all of us who provide health care back to a place of caring, which means questioning ourselves, getting to know our patients, and loving our patients. I have known and worked with Dr. Lichten for approximately six years.  During that time I have been most impressed by his absolute commitment to the health and welfare of his patients.  This has caused Dr. Lichten to constantly question the traditional dogma of medicine, and at times traditional care provided to patients.  He has been on a quest to know all that is known about health, including educating himself about traditional, complementary, and alternative forms of therapy.  This has led him to collide with the medical administration and to, at times to move toward  natural health  to support his patients as he searches for truth and patient-centered solutions.   Ernie Yoder, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.C.P. --Ernest Yoder, M.D., prefaceNew Book Reveals Benefits of Aggressive Hormone Therapy to Prevent and Treat a Wide Range of Disorders  For the past 27 years, Life Extension has interacted with pioneering physicians who have developed novel methods of treating chronic illnesses.  While these doctors prescribe avant-garde therapies in their daily practices, their innovations too often remain unpublished and out of the public domain, thus depriving the world of vital life-saving information.  Edward Lichten, MD, FACS, has painstakingly put in to writing the many successful protocols he has discovered in his decades of clinical practice. Among the disorders covered are congestive heart failure, type II diabetes, adrenal exhaustion, migraine, insomnia, andropause, osteoporosis, fibromyalgia, and others. The Textbook of Bio-Identical Hormones provides creative strategies for circumventing chronic illnesses that are not adequately treated by mainstream medicine. It will help enlighten both physicians and interested lay people about aggressive, but safe methods to combat the most prevalent health concerns of today s aging population. Dr. Lichten s Personal Experience Based on his extensive clinical experience, Dr. Lichten s book not only illustrates the essential benefits of restoring hormone balance in aging men and women, but more importantly, directly tackles the controversy that surrounds hormone replacement. Unfortunately, most physicians fail to properly understand the body s need for hormones at all stages of life, and are therefore unnecessarily reluctant to prescribe proper hormone therapy for their patients. Despite the complexity of this topic, the Textbook of Bio-Identical Hormones speaks to the reader in a friendly, conversational tone. Dr. Lichten clearly states from the very beginning of the book that,  I am compelled to write this book because of the dangerous state of confusion that exists concerning what aging women and men should do to properly balance their hormones.   Vitamin D for Protection  The Textbook of Bio-Identical Hormones opens with an important discussion of the often overlooked yet critically important pro-hormone, vitamin D. Once believed to do little more than regulate bone health, vitamin D is a multi-functional hormone precursor that is increasingly being recognized as a crucial factor in protecting against various cancers, preserving bone integrity, bolstering the immune system, and even warding off debilitating depression. Dr. Lichten emphasizes that,  The majority of humans do not have adequate blood levels of vitamin D and maladies that occur in response to less than optimal vitamin D include insomnia, heart disease, and cancer.   So, what does vitamin D have to do with hormone therapy? Dr. Lichten makes an interesting connection,  I am particularly concerned about women being prescribed estrogen drugs without factoring in their needs for natural progesterone, vitamin D and a healthy diet,  he states.  Vitamin D functions as a cell regulatory brake to protect against the initiation and progression of common cancers, including those of the breast. Prescribing aging women estrogen without ensuring adequate vitamin D status is analogous to driving a car without brakes,  he states.  Dr. Lichten is not alone in sounding the alarm regarding this crucial but underappreciated pro-hormone. His chapter on vitamin D is supported by the knowledge that vitamin D insufficiency, as well as outright deficiency, is rampant among men, women and children throughout the developed world, including the United States. <more> --Dale Kiefer: Life Extension Magazine Dec 2007