2021 Reprint of the 1962 Edition. Facsimile of the original edition and not reproduced with Optical Recognition Software. Donaldson advocated fresh fat meat, water, and exercise to treat allergies, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension, gallstones and obesity. The book described "the big bad seven" foods: milk, cream, ice cream, eggs, cheese, chocolate and flour which should be eliminated from the diet. Surgeon Charles G. Heyd wrote a supportive preface for the book.
The diet that Donaldson put his patients on consisted of three fatty steaks a day, three cups of coffee and six glasses of water.
Strong Medicine
attracted considerable controversy. It was criticized by physician Morris Fishbein who commented that the "book is hardly scientific, so presumably what the physician was taught in his youth he has forgotten in his later years." Donaldson's extreme dietary views were classified by Fredrick J. Stare as "food faddism". Despite this, the book continues to have followers and promoters to this day.