I normally post about things I’m reading after I’ve read them. However this one is going to take a bit longer to get through, and I’m getting ready for my Now update, and want to include this in there.
As with many things that I’ve written about, it goes without saying that the work of Richard Bernstein, MD was not introduced to me in medical school, or in any part of my medical training. I am only finding out about him now, which is semi-incredible, because he’s the engineer-turned-physician that discovered the benefit of glucose testing for people with diabetes.
Living With Diabetes Without Information
This is going to sound naive, because I am naive in this area. I know a lot about LGBTQ health and a lot about conditions including HIV, and see similarities to the treatment of diabetes that I hadn’t considered before (and were never explained to me). This includes the feeling that your condition is managing you rather than the other way around. Bernstein tells his own story in the introduction:
In spite of the low-fat diet, my blood cholesterol and triglycerides became very high. I developed visible signs of this state— fatty growths on my eyelids and gray deposits around the iris of each eye.
Bernstein, Richard K.. Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution: The Complete Guide to Achieving Normal Blood Sugars (p. xiv). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition.
It’s the story of waiting for things to manifest, that could do so at any time, with the double insult of being told that this is normal:
I would point these out to my diabetologist (who was then president of the American Diabetes Association), but I was inevitably told, “Don’t worry, it has nothing to do with your diabetes. You’re doing fine.”
Bernstein, Richard K.. Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution: The Complete Guide to Achieving Normal Blood Sugars (p. xiv). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition.
Being a Misfit in Medicine
As explained, and as I understand from others, Bernstein was not accepted as an innovator in the field and to an extent is still not accepted by some, even though he is fully credentialed and on faculty at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
In this talk at Low Carb Breckenridge, Jake Kushner, MD (@JakeKushnerMD) referred to this lack of acceptance.
Richard Bernstein himself operates a YouTube channel where he answers questions from readers every month, which I have also started watching. Power of social media 🙂 .
This is what he says in the pages of the introduction. This is going to be a good read.
Finally, much of what I will cover in this book is in direct opposition to the recommendations of the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and other national diabetes associations. Why? Because if I had followed those guidelines, they would have killed me long ago. Such conflicts include the low-carbohydrate diet I recommend; the avoidance of certain oral agents (such as sulfonylureas) that impair surviving insulin-producing beta cells in type 2 diabetics; my preference for certain insulins over others, which I avoid; my desire to preserve remaining beta cells (an alien concept to traditional practice); and my insistence that diabetics are entitled to the same normal blood sugars that nondiabetics enjoy, rather than the ADA’s current insistence upon higher levels. Most important, unlike the ADA guidelines, ours work.
Bernstein, Richard K.. Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution: The Complete Guide to Achieving Normal Blood Sugars (p. xi). Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition.
Source:Dr. Bernstein’s Diabetes Solution: The Complete Guide to Achieving Normal Blood Sugars