By Eugenia Zukerman & Julie R. Ingelfinger, MD
Have you ever had the chance to experience the tranquil sounds of classical music? I’ll bet you have. Have you ever picked each and every instrument out one-by-one as your brain separates wood from string?

These are the thoughts that leaped into my mind, as I read the brief introduction on the co-author, Eugenia Zukerman. Eugenia is an international flutist with a career as a television correspondent (and writer) for a major television network, whose career was in danger due to a life threatening lung disease- Eosinophilic Pneumonitis. This disease is not viral nor bacterial, but causes massive inflammation, affecting the ability of the lungs to
oxygenate blood.

Once the musicians received her diagnosis, she contacted her sister
(Co-Author) Julie R. Ingelfinger, MD. who is head of the
Pediatric Nephrology Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, as
well as an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Ingelfinger
had been in Practice for 25 years (at the time the book was published.)

Fifty-year-old Eugenia was in the prime of her life, enjoying a fruitful
career and
happily married with two-grown daughters, when she received the life changing
news that she had lung disease which had to be treated and controlled with
Prednisone. The first thing that came to mind was her career and her
appearance. Eugenia was a flutist, music was her life and playing the flute
requires a healthy set of lungs. But given that Eugenia was also a television
correspondent, her appearance was also a major concern. She knew first hand
about a colleague who was taking Prednisone to treat her MS, who
gained 40 lbs.
Eugenia was worried about the side-effects, the weight gain was a huge
issue. Eugenia confided in her sister who had plenty of experience treating
patients with high doses of Prednisone.

The siblings teamed together to write an amazing book that is packed with
definitions and the over-all personal experience. that you really
don’t get when you seek to educate yourself about a medical condition or a
particular medication. They give you views, both from a patient’s and a doctor’s
standpoint. The dialogue between the two in regards to what is Prednisone was a surprise to me. I honestly expected to just read a lot of
medical terms and why doctors prescribe Prednisone but I was mistaken. This book
takes you on a 10 month journey of personal view-points and medical view points

Reviewer rating: 9 —I have to give
this one a strong nine. Living with a chronic
Illness is hard enough and taking medications adds to the over-all frustration
of
dealing with your illness. This book holds up a two-way mirror for
both doctor
and patient and can even aid in caregivers. Pick it up if you’ve been just
diagnosed with an illness that Prednisone is prescribed to treat, have been
taking Prednisone, or have a close relative or friend who is on this
medication, so you can understand the drug in depth. It also gives ways to
slow weight gain, one of the drug’s biggest side effects. PICK IT UP!!!