Franziska Spritzler, RD, CDE
Dr. Sarah Hallberg’s passing in March of 2022 was a terrible loss for her family, friends, colleagues, and the keto/low-carb community.
Sarah was truly a special person whose admirable qualities included kindness, brilliance, humor, tenacity, and modesty, to name just a few.
In Status Quo Thinking is Harming Your Health: A Physician’s Final Plea, written in her final year of living with Stage IV lung cancer, Sarah discusses her frustration with standard medical care, particularly as it relates to metabolic disease – and why it’s crucial to challenge conventional thinking on this topic.
After a captivating forward written by acclaimed journalist Nina Teicholz, Sarah shares the details of her remarkable career devoted to improving patient health in her engaging, relatable style. As she says early on, “This is my story, and it’s your story, too.”
A Caring Medical Resident and Clinician
From the beginning of Sarah’s medical training, she was clearly guided by a strong compassion for her patients and a desire to always do the right thing.
As a resident, she learned to speak up for herself and even “talk back” to more experienced doctors if needed. Sarah was an exceptional communicator who took an individualized approach to each patient, always considering the severity of their condition and state of mind. When she gave a patient devastating news, she allowed them to speak, listened intently, and responded empathetically. And she always touched or hugged them while they cried, sometimes even crying with them.
Sarah realized that patients need to feel empowered to make decisions and maintain a sense of control, regardless of how dire their situation might seem. And she understood that none of us can live without hope.
As a family practice doctor who was deeply concerned about patients who struggled with their weight, she was excited to be given the opportunity to start an obesity program at her hospital. After attending conferences and reading evidence-based books about carbohydrate reduction, including The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living by Jeff Volek, PhD, RD, and Steve Phinney, MD, she knew that this was the approach she wanted the participants in her program to take. However, she couldn’t have come to this decision without rejecting the conventional wisdom she’d been led to believe: that low-fat, low-calorie diets are best for losing weight and improving health.
An Inspirational Low Carb Researcher and Advocate
After a life-changing discussion with Dr. Phinney in 2015, Sarah began working at Virta Health as the principal investigator on their ketogenic diet study in people with type 2 diabetes. She provides fascinating details about Virta’s early days and all the hard work and long hours that went into setting up and conducting that study, a continuous remote care intervention focused on nutritional ketosis with close monitoring by physicians and health coaches. Next, she discusses the publication of their groundbreaking study results at one and two years, featuring impressive rates of diabetes reversal, discontinuation of insulin and other medications, weight loss, and exceptionally high participant retention.
Throughout her book, Sarah challenges the “status quo” thinking among healthcare professionals and public policymakers. An obvious example of such thinking is the belief that type 2 diabetes is a chronic condition that will need more treatment over time, even though mounting evidence – published by Virta researchers and others – shows that type 2 diabetes and prediabetes can be reversed or put into remission with a well-formulated ketogenic diet.
A well-formulated ketogenic diet is high in fat, moderate in protein, and very low in carbohydrates. Sarah ponders whether the “high fat” label may be part of why people are reluctant to adopt this way of eating; they equate dietary fat with body fat. She suggests that if this macronutrient had a different name, keto might have less resistance!
I was fortunate to talk to Sarah at several conferences. The first time was in 2015, just a couple of weeks before her inspirational TedTalk, Reversing type 2 diabetes starts with ignoring the guidelines, which went viral after a few days and currently has over 11 million views.
Even though that video and her work were criticized by some mainstream nutrition and medical professionals, she continued to speak out in order to spread the message that diabetes reversal is entirely possible; worsening disease requiring more and more medication is not inevitable.
It can be tough for people in the healthcare field to explore new evidence, change their mind, and publicly admit they were wrong. Nearly every low carb advocate was once in that position. But we need to encourage those rooted in status quo thinking to examine the evidence supporting carbohydrate reduction with an open mind so they will understand the life-changing benefits it can provide to those struggling with diabetes or obesity.
An Exceptional Human Being
Whenever I spoke with Sarah, she was warm, down-to-earth, humble, and brimming with enthusiasm. The health and happiness of her patients, colleagues, friends, and family were clearly her highest priority, as is evidenced throughout her book. I knew from the moment I met her that she was an amazing person. After reading her memoir, my admiration and appreciation for her grew. What a force this woman was!
Following her cancer diagnosis in 2017, she continued working tirelessly while undergoing treatment – including caring for patients in the Virta study, presenting at conferences, and formally speaking to Congress about changing the US Dietary Guidelines for Americans – in an effort to accomplish as much as she could in the time she had left.
She left us far too soon and is dearly missed by the many people whose lives she touched and changed for the better.
Fortunately, we have her many video presentations, podcast interviews, papers, and now, her book.
I highly recommend Status Quo Thinking is Harming Your Health: A Physician’s Final Plea to anyone who believes that we need to change the current standard of care to empower people to take control of their health – and shouldn’t that be all of us?
Purchase Status Quo Thinking is Harming Your Health: A Physician’s Final Plea here.
Book Review written by Franziska Spritzler, RD, CDE
