Integrated Women's Health: Holistic Approaches For Comprehensive Care. - Review - book review

AORN Journal, Dec, 2000 by Diane Duran

INTEGRATED WOMEN'S HEALTH: HOLISTIC APPROACHES FOR COMPREHENSIVE CARE By Ellen Olshansky 2000, 436 pp $39 paperback

This book provides an overview of health care issues facing women today. The author discusses issues such as cardiovascular health, respiratory health, asthma, and chronic conditions (eg, hypertension, arthritis, diabetes). Current issues and controversies are addressed as well, such as breast, colorectal, skin, and endometrial cancers, as well as infections and autoimmune conditions.

The author reminds the reader that being ill can be frightening, and that traditional pharmacologic methods of wellness may not work for everyone. From her background as a therapist, the author presents alternative medicines and therapies used by women for centuries. She also discusses herbal and homeopathic remedies for each of the aforementioned health issues. The history, techniques, advantages, and adverse incidents related to acupuncture are explained in detail.

In treating illness and teaching wellness, the author guides the reader through spiritual approaches, biofeedback, and music therapy, which has been used for many years in preoperative and postoperative areas. She includes art and sand play, as well as drama and dance therapy, in her mission to prevent and treat illness. As a holistic practitioner, the author devotes an entire chapter to therapeutic touch. Techniques used in pain control, wound healing, labor and delivery, and caring for the terminally ill are presented. Descriptions of quilting as an exemplar of art therapy and storytelling as a tool for providing holistic care, along with one woman's story about returning to wellness after a stroke, bring the book to an extraordinary ending.

A drawback for perioperative nurse readers is that the author does not come from a perioperative background, and she mentions the surgical patient very few times. In addition, a chapter discussing the health care of women in Nicaragua is included, which seems a little out of place.

Patients with chronic or acute illnesses will be able to glean hope of wellness from the author's experiences with patients, both inside and outside the hospital. I highly recommend this book to women everywhere. It is unusual to find a book that covers so many women's health care issues and one that makes their treatment and prevention so easily readable and well understood.

This book is available from Aspen Publishers, 200 Orchard Ridge Dr, Gaithersburg, MD, 20878; www.aspenpublishers.com.

DIANE DURAN RN, MSN, CNAA VASCULAR SURGERY PATIENT CARE MANAGER NEW YORK PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL