I honestly forgot most of this book immediately after reading it and had to skim the whole thing again. I was honestly expecting more along the lines of what to do to take care of your health and reverse illness. That's not really what this book is about. It's more along the lines of how to speak up for your health care decisions, talk to your doctor and navigate the health care system. There are basics about taking care of your health, but it is definitely along the lines of traditional medical tests, medications and medical care, without a real focus on the dietary and lifestyle choices that can lead to better health. Fine information, but there really wasn't anything new for me.

I read a digital ARC of this book for review.

I wanted to love this book. As an Integrative Life + Wellness Coach, I had high hopes that a book subtitled "What You Can Do to Make Better Choices About Your Health" would be heavily weighted toward the "What You Can Do," and actual "Health." Unfortunately, it doesn't deliver on its promise in either regard. Firstly, 65 percent of the book is concerned with how the "healthcare" industry got to such a confusing, red-tape laden place and why it's hard for patients to make good medical decisions. This leads to my second issue with "Your Life Depends On It" - the fact that isn't really about making choices about health as much as it is about making decisions after you are sick. There is barely a whisper of preventative, proactive, health-oriented choosing here, as it's mostly focused on navigating the terminology of diagnoses and medications and making sure you're in the room when the medical professionals are making care decisions about conditions or illnesses. To be fair, this kind of information and advice have their place, but this book makes different promises. I felt like the hospital band on the cover was a warning of sorts - your life depends on making healthy choices to avoid ending up hospitalized and reliant on pharmaceuticals. In actuality, it's an avatar. And lastly, even in the final third devoted to "Better Medical Decision-Making," the advice for patients is thin compared to recommendations for health care professionals and health care systems (which are not ostensibly the target audiences for the content promised). Ultimately, the book was too heavily weighted on history and the psychology of why things are hard and spent too little time delivering actionable advice that could lead to healthier readers.

I received a pre-publication copy of this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

It's a very informative read with some interesting parts but I didn't fully connect with this book for some reason. It may have simply been the style that it's written in. It is still however a very book to read.

Book is well written, message is clear, informative, and useful. I read this on a kindle, and I can imagine the experience for reading content like this would be a lot more enjoyable in a print format with good typesetting. This is by no means a criticism of the book, just a note to self about the impact of medium.

A very important topic but also, a controversial one in a sense that there are many people out there who have no clue what to do with medical information when they are suffering from a disease. They are already struggling with the difficultness and a lot of pressure, sometimes they can experience social stigma and it is very hard to deal with all that.

As someone whose many family members were cancer patients, I have to say, that I always felt there are not enough information out there, luckily for me I am fluent in English so I can always search on that topic more, but I wish that the doctors in Serbia are giving out more other information, some additional things that could help the patients get through their treatment. From the firsthand experience, I noticed that not many doctors know how to explain something in a layman's term, they would use fancy Latin words, which is fine of course if they are talking to the medical worker, but not if you are talking to someone who is already scared with what he/she is going through.

All the outlined advice were helpful, and I hope that the author will have influence readers to think about it or at least try to implement them.

I have a handful of minor medical issues and have been no stranger to the doctors office and the healthcare system. This was insightful and was full of information. Honestly, it’s not a book I’d recommend to my friends just because they wouldn’t read a book on this subject matter. I learned a lot from it and that was my intent. It’s a large, rather depressing subject but it was by no means boring. Well done!

This was a very thought-provoking, valuable book. It is well-researched and documented and draws from many varied sources to draw conclusions. It's not light reading, so I would really recommend pacing yourself and tackling, at most, a chapter at a time in order to retain as much of this very useful information.

I especially appreciated the "Takeaways" sections and loved that they were broken down by audience. The inclusion of doctors' and health-care administrators' perspectives and concerns was fascinating and helps frame ideas in the most holistic way possible. Empathy for the varied factors that go into why we do things how we do them will help me make better decisions and advocate more effectively for myself and our overall healthcare system.

Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review!

It's not horrible, but there is definitely better books out there. I tend not to speak negatively about books as I think there is amazingness in them all, this one in particular I couldn't find to much I liked about it. The author is still a very excellent writer, I think the main issue is that this book wasn't exactly my type! I'd still recommend it if it's what your into and you'd like to form your own opinion.

What an interesting book! What I like about this book is that the author takes the time to explain what is wrong with the medical system without attacking it, scaremongering, or relying on exaggeration. The tips in this book are useful to all of us, regardless of age, gender, or medical condition. In an age where healthcare professionals are rushed and overworked and patients are fatigued by navigating the system, this book is useful in establishing a better doctor-patient relationship.