Prominent Doctor to Discuss Her Book at Library
The Friends of the Palisades Library will host a lively and informative talk by Nina Shapiro, M.D., on Thursday, September 20 at 6:30 p.m. in the library’s community room, 861 Alma Real. The Brentwood resident will speak about her new book, “HYPE: A Doctor’s Guide to Medical Myths, Exaggerated Claims and Bad Advice,” subtitled “How to Tell What’s Real and What’s Not.” Free admission.
In this time of information overload, Shapiro, a surgeon and professor at UCLA, uses evidence-based knowledge to dispel many popular health misconceptions. Her book (published in May by St. Martin’s Press) also teaches the reader how to evaluate the various, often conflicting, medical studies that are reported in the media, and how to separate fact from fiction so that we can make informed health and medical choices.
“Every home should have a copy of HYPE,” said Sanjay Gupta, CNN’s chief medical correspondent and best-selling author. “As a top doctor but also as a mom, wife and friend, Shapiro knows what matters most to her readers. She also knows how to skillfully blend knowledge with engaging and entertaining stories.”
“HYPE,” written with Kristin Loberg, has chapters that focus on “The Wild West of Internet Medicine,” “How to Make Sense of Medical Research Jargon,” “How to Filter Out the Noise on Juicing, Going Gluten-Free, Detoxing, and GMOs,” “How to Read a Label,” “How to Remain Vital Without Vitamins,” “How to Stay Natural While Taking Your Medicine,” “How Vaccines Save the Community, the Home, and Your Health,” “How to Determine When to Get Checked, X-rayed, Swabbed, or Poked,” “How to Age Gracefully, Without Really Trying” and “When Walking Beats Running” (by a doctor who has completed the Boston and L.A. Marathons).
“The purpose of this book,” Shapiro writes in her introduction, “is to wake you up to the truth about popular health advice and offer a thoughtful, reliable guide for becoming a smart health consumer and patient.”
Shapiro, who graduated from Harvard Medical School (1991), comes from a family of doctors. Her husband, Elliot, is a cancer surgeon at UCLA, where she is the Director of Pediatric Otolaryngology and a Professor of Head and Neck Surgery. The couple lives in Brentwood.
Described as “a seasoned and dynamic public speaker,” Shapiro has appeared on many broadcast programs and has been featured and published in the Wall Street Journal, the L.A. Times, Hollywood Reporter, Redbook, Real Simple and other print and online publications.