Lexington, KY - When you get advice from a doctor, the next thing you often do is to get a second opinion. Dr. Rallie McAllister of Lexington decided pregnant women and mothers could use a whole lot more than that.
When looking at pregnancy books, she and business partner Jennifer Bright Reich mostly saw books written by a single author.
"But a lot of topics are really controversial," McAllister said, citing issues such as circumcision, breast feeding and sharing a bed with a child. "So we set out to interview a lot of different doctors and present different viewpoints."
What they created is Momosa Publishing and so far two books: Mommy MD Guide to Pregnancy and Birth and Mommy MD Guide to Your Baby's First Year, compiling advice from doctors who are also mothers.
"You get two or three, four or five viewpoints," McAllister said. "You might decide it's not necessarily wrong to bottle-feed your child."
They also created MommyMD Guides.com, an advice website for mothers, where mothers can ask questions of doctor-mothers. That led to DaddyMDGuides.com, a similar concept for doctor-dads, and related books.
The books for mothers include more than 900 tips from 60 different doctor-mothers. "Some of the stories are really funny," McAllister said. "They talk about their misunderstandings and their 'aha' moments. It's very entertaining."
The anecdotes also remind new mothers who are not doctors that not even medical professionals have all the answers.
"They're just human, too, but they've found out some really great ways to make things work," McAllister said.
The books aren't just about medical issues, but about social situations, also - from baby showers to letting people know about a pregnancy to juggling work and parenting.
McAllister is a native of eastern Tennessee and earned her medical degree from James H. Quillen College of Medicine at East Tennessee State University in 1995. She is a family physician who works in Danville, Barbourville and Pikeville in Kentucky, and the mother of three sons, one grown (born before med school) and two teenagers (after med school).
McAllister has written other health-related books, a syndicated column titled "Rallie on Health" and worked as a public speaker. The creation of Momosa started about four years ago, with Reich, a veteran of Rodale Publishing, serving as co-author.
The Momosa plan is to continue offering books for parents of progressively older children. (McAllister jokes that it will end with the guide to getting your 26-year-old to move out of your basement - but no, she has not had a 26-year-old living in her basement.)
There are also blogs on the website, a Twitter feed and Facebook updates. The books also are now available on the Nook and Kindle electronic readers.
And McAllister and Reich recently finished developing a parenting smart-phone application adapted from their "Guide to Pregnancy and Birth."
"That is the way a lot of mothers will be getting their information," McAllister said. "It's very exciting."