August

I think this is one of the better books on PCOS - the other one that I have read that I think is excellent is PCOS: The Hidden Epidemic by Dr Thatcher - both books are excellent. I believe that "The Savvy Woman's Guide To PCOS" is essentially a reworked and updated version of Dr Vliet's book "It's My Ovaries, Stupid!!!" - probably plus and minus a few subjects.

I believe this book contains all the basic information about PCOS that one would hope or expect to find (with the possible exception of information on conception and pregnancy). The quality of the information is excellent, I think. One real strengths of this book is the information on sex hormones especially female sex hormones - I think there is often a lack of information on the 'female' sex hormones in other PCOS books. There is an interesting section on "theories about causes" of PCOS. There is also information about endocrine disrupting chemicals and excitotoxins - things we probably all ought to be more concerned about and diligent about avoiding.

There is not a lot of emphasis on fertility per se like trying to conceive but the information on obtaining better health would likely be helpful to anyone with PCOS regardless of their goals- but if conception is your primary goal the Thatcher book might be a better fit or at least you would likely want other book(s) on PCOS with more info on achieving conception to augment. There is a section menopause which I think is a neglected subject related to PCOS - that we are (hopefully) all going to face someday.

This book is written by a medical doctor and that prospective is reflected. There is a whole section on vitamins and minerals and a few other nutrients and there is information on diet and exercise and very good information on bio-identical hormone replacement but there is not a lot of other information on treatment options that would be considered "natural" or "alternative" and in fact there seems to be a concern about interactions between herbal supplements and prescriptions medication. Again the emphasis of the book is on medical treatment and there is a complete section on prescription medications and the medical treatments options for PCOS.

There is detailed information about an extensive list of hormones that Dr Vliet tests for and what test results "mean" - this would likely be very valuable information to any PCOS patient who has had hormone testing done or is considering it.

This is probably more of a book to be used as a reference than just to read cover to cover once or twice. The Table on contents is very detailed and would be very helpful but unfortunately, at least for my copy that I got soon after it was published, the page numbers are off by a couple of pages in the table of contents - it is still somewhat easy to find the information that I am looking for if I keep in mind that it will probably be a page or two back from what the contents says it will be as each new subject and subsection is highlighted and bolded and in large font- there also is not an index in the back, which would have been helpful.