This is an excellent look at the hidden factors behind your health. The author explains how for decades, western medicine has been obsessed with treating just the body. If doctors could treat your cells, organs, and systems, then of course your health problems would be cared for, right? Not exactly. It's becoming more accepted that health is a combination of physical, mental, and social elements. The status of any one of those aspects can impact the others in drastic ways.
I appreciated that this book was written with a vocabulary that will be accessible to the average reader. There's a bit of scientific explanation about what happens on top of your DNA (epigenetic changes are fascinating--your DNA remains what it is, but chemical groups can attach to it as you go through various experiences, and impact the way your body works, even in successive generations), but most of the book is anecdotes and interpretation of scientific studies. Each chapter ends with a "tool kit" of ways that you can try to take charge of your own social, mental, and emotional well-being.
The main things I got out of this book were: To be healthier, it is absolutely vital to stay socially connected, to welcome physical touch such as hugs from loved ones, to be fully present in the moment as much as possible, and to be kind and attentive to others to create a ripple effect of healthier feelings in the community around us. This is not just feel-good advice, but has measurable effects on the inflammatory tendencies of the body...the very things responsible for many health problems.
I would like to try to implement several of the points from this book myself. It is definitely worth a read for anyone who is interested in the intersecting paths of health, feelings, and community.

Thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for this advance digital review copy. ( )

Soft skills, encompassing kindness, compassion, empathy, and inclusion, are argued to be just as importance as hard skills, application of knowledge and experience, when it comes to overall physical, emotional, and mental heath. To belong, to be cared for, to have someone care for you is showed to seemingly have an impact on your well being. ( )

The Rabbit Effect: Live Longer, Happier, and Haelthier With the Groundbreaking Science of Kindness
by Kelli Harding, MD, MPH
due 8-27-2019
Atria Books
5.0 / 5.0

#netgalley. #TheRabbitEffect.

Amazing book and premise. One I totally agree with. This will empower you to change not just your overall physical health, but our mental health by making choices to be more kind, accepting and inclusive. Small choices made daily and our experiences with others create a cultural fabric that has a larger effect on our health than previously thought.

It began in 1978, when a Columbia University Doctor designed an experiment to establish a correlation between heart health and high blood cholesterol, using rabbits. She discovered nurturing, kindness and interaction made the difference between a heart attack and a healthy heart. Feeling supported and cared for made a huge difference in our ability to heal.

The Whithall Study was started to look for biological factors for heart disease. What it uncovered was a link between mind and body, a correlation between level of education and physical health. Kindness, support and inclusion are as much, if not more, healing than medicine alone. Dr. Engels Biopsychosocial model showed The Hidden Factors in health: social experiences can alter DNA through epigenetic processes. Community and social ties can help you remain more healthy.

Clearly we are missing something in medicine when in 2016, USA ranked 43rd in life expectancy. In 2015, life expectancy dropped for the first time in 2 decades. In 2017 it dropped again.
In maternal care, USA ranked 46th, the worst rate or maternal deaths in the developed world.
And out of the 32 wealthiest countries in the world, USA is 32nd, last place, on the health-wealth inequality.
Clearly, as a country that spends so much on health care, we are missing something.

I believe the mind body connection is such an important idea and premise for our future, our health and our well-being.
Kindness is a healer.
Acceptance is a healer.
We need leadership in this country that we can have confidence, dignity and pride in following. A feeling of hope, camaraderie, different but equal. It's not to late.
Small choice,every day. It matters.
Positive energy and acceptance. It matters.
It's time to get with it.

At the end of each chapter is a Tool Box of ideas, suggestions, support and help.
This is truly a revolutionary thought, and book.
I highly recommend it for every single person!

Thanks to Netgalley, Atria books and the author, Kelli Harding for sending this requested e-book ARC for review. ( )