Love, Medicine and Miracles: Lessons Learned about Self-Healing from a Surgeon's Experience with Exceptional Patients

This book is a must read if you are struggling with an illness or long term medical issue. It was suggested to me when I feared I would have chronic shingles. My friend's brother beat cancer in part using the concepts in this book. It helped me better understand the link between the mind and the body, and how important that link is for health.

I read Love, Medicine and Miracles while going through an illness, and it gave me the hope I needed to keep going. Bernie Siegel’s message—that courage, compassion, and active participation in healing matter—resonated deeply. His stories and insights felt like comfort from someone who truly understood. Though I never got to meet him, this book made his presence real, and it remains one of the most uplifting resources I’ve encountered. A gift of strength when I needed it most.

I discovered this book in the late 1980s after my Dad's death from colon cancer. What I love about Bernie Siegal is that he does not recommend a particular cancer treatment. He writes about a way to view oneself. In the days when he began to change the way he saw his patients, passivity was the norm for those with life threatening illness. One was encouraged to merely do as the doctor said, not ask questions, and die quietly. I have now been a healthcare worker for well over 30 years, and I am seeing a resurgence of this attitude among institutions. Today's idea is to see the "patient" as a "customer" and to sell fear, (as I see it). We've turned back to encouraging passivity. The lifesaving measures for you or your loved one may be inside the walls of a healthcare facility, or maybe not. ASK QUESTIONS! On the other hand, that alternative practitioner could be preying upon the uninformed. ASK QUESTIONS. What I see as important about what Bernie is saying is that you must find out how you "see it", rather than buying whatever we (mainstream or alternative) have to sell you. The best way to survive the medical maze is to participate in your recovery, in your very life. Your specific answers are not here, but ways to seek them are indeed inside this volume. Bernie's writing is enlightening and positive, though not in a simplistic "put on a smile" way. I believe this is a must read for those living with cancer and for their families. A supposedly scientific study stated that positivity does not statistically improve survival rates. Who gives a damn? I, personally, would rather have a short, happy life than a long, miserable one. When I come near death, joy is what I want for myself and for my family.

No one can explain so well what Dr Siegel advises for doctors, nurses and especially patients navigating tough medical diagnoses. No matter what faces you, this book helps. First read it 35 years ago. Have reread recently after cancer diagnosis. Have bought at least 2 dz over the years to give as gifts. And to educate doctors and nurses and facilities. A must read for all medical and dental schools.

A brilliant read for any person living with cancer. It is also a highly recommended read for family members frustrated by the lack of compassion with which oncologolists treat their patients. It accurately protrays the arrogance with which the majority of oncologists deal with their patients and the sense of hopelessness they instill in their patients through their attitude and fixation with treating patients as statistics, playing God and placing a timeframe on their time left on earth. This book should be a must read for oncologists before qualifying.

Great book for anyone that has loved one’s going thur cancer. I gave the book to my daughter who is a RN case manager at the hospital for there recovery cancer ward.

If you have a loved one facing the devastating news of cancer or any life threatening illness, this is a fantastic tool to put in their hands or read together if it is your significant other or your child. HOPE lives in between the pages of this and the other books and materials from Dr Bernie Siegel. My late husband and I had the blessing of attending Dr. Siegel's seminars and workshops back so many years ago and my and my hubby's outlook into his disease were forever changed. We had been handed a sentence by an oncologist that had no understanding that his job was first to heal. Dr Siegel changed that and I attribute to his teachings much of the time we had together that was far beyond the initial prognosis. My heart is grateful even after two decades since my beloved went on to meet the Lord because I recall how this loving doctor Siegel made a difference to us. Today I find myself buying this book for one of my parents who has been diagnosed with Cancer. The journey begins anew. Blessings upon all of you who are confronted with an illness that is threatening your life or the life of someone beloved to you. -- Please let me know if you find my review helpful. It is always nice to know writing these reviews makes a difference.

When I review for Amazon (and other places), I usually write a traditional review. Doing so for this book seems redundant. I was recommending it once again--snagging that URL for two cancer patients--when it occurred to me I should pass on the love. In the early 90s, when Cancer was still the big, frightening capital C word, this book not only got me through uterine cancer intact (that is, sans uterus but healthy attitude), it changed the way I live on a daily basis. More than a decade later, I still live differently. I don't believe that we must agree with everything in a book for it to be a great one. The idea of books is that they expose us to new ideas or show us a new aspect of something we needed to see. Though published in 1990, this book is--for the essential parts, the inspirational parts--still as valid today. I hope everyone with a life-threatening illness finds it or something like it. A book that can change their lives. In the minute. In the moment. ----- Reviewed by Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of eight time award-winning THIS IS THE PLACE, three-time award-winning HARKENING, and TRACINGS, a chapbook book of poetry awarded a medal of excellence by the Military Writers Society of America.