Author Melanie Weiss, who is a nurse, wrote In a Pickle Over PANDAS to help explain the autoimmune disorder called Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Streptococcus. PANDAS is also known as PANS.

In a Pickle Over PANDAS tells about how PANDAS develops, how it can be treated, and how it affects children. The illustrations help tell about the illness and how PANDAS is treated.

The writing is probably targeted for older children as it is somewhat complex. Parents could read this book to their child to help explain how PANDAS may affect their child.

Recommend.

Review written after downloading a galley book from NetGalley.

My son has a long term health condition, not PANDAs but this is a great book for explaining the illness to children that have it or siblings of those who do. It is so hard to be a 'poorly' kid and anything that helps them feel better or understand a little better about themselves the better. If only books like this were out there for other childhood health conditions.

My son chose this book because he thought the title was fun. The story was actually very informative and he learned a lot from it. Great book!

This is a great book to help a child understand commonalities between themselves and other children with PANDAS. I think there may be a few excess words which may not allow the reader to hold a childs attention for very long, but with some creative work from the adult reader, it can help children understand their positions a little better.

PANDAS is the acronym for Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Streptococcus. I’ll be quite honest and say I had never heard about it before reading this fantastic book. It is a sudden onset, unusual and terrifying condition with many symptoms that are discussed in such a child friendly way that it explains this frightening illness to anyone suffering from it.

I believe this book should also be read by parents, teachers and anyone working with children as the sooner the symptoms are recognised and treatment started the better! No, I don’t mean that teachers should be diagnosing this but they could alert parents to the possibility of their child having this so they can see a doctor to check.

Thanks to the author, publishers and NetGalley, too, for letting me read an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A great niche book. Some kids could really benefit.

This book introduced me to a neuropsychiatric syndrome I had not heard of. Like the child on receiving his diagnosis, I thought pandas were black and white bears, not the complicated condition so supportively explained in this book.
Would that we could have such a thorough explanatory book for children facing all manner of conditions.

Initially, I thought this book would be good for doctor’s offices to use to explain to kids what was happening to them. Then, as the book went on, it was more scary than anything. The fact that it took so long to fix seemed discouraging to me. I would think this would be better to read towards the end of the illness rather than at the diagnosis.

Before my review, I feel the need to give a quick summary of my own medical history. I was born with a fraked heart, grew up in and out of hospitals from the day I was born (literally, I had my first open heart surgery the day after I was born) until I was around five. I'm still sick, will always be sick, and it has shaped who I am and who I will become. This is all important because I am going to be a little critical of this story, but I've been the child and I've also worked with kids who are going through things beyond what any child should ever have to understand. While my story started immediately in my life, I still had to learn about my body and problems to explain to adults as I grew up. In that sense, we all have the same story. Okay, on to the review!

The author seemed unsure of what age she was writing for. The boy in the pictures was fairly young, but Weiss used massively long words (and their acronyms) as well as words that shouldn't appear in children/semi-picture books, "screwy." Really?! Yes, the medical terms and acronyms were used to teach the child, but an elementary school student is just going to start blanking out on you, especially when you continue using the acronym in the story. Say the word, that's fine. But give the definition is simple, plain terms. It's not a quiz. They just need to know generics. Then continue to call the IV an IV, not the medicine that's in it! I mean, hell, it was a lot to take in and I'm a medical assistant!

There was so much going on. Every page was a different symptom, and there was never relief. It was just scarier and scarier. Disease and hospitals are scary enough for kids. A book like this should only ever help, not make it worse. Discussing anxiety is important, but drawing an image of a black shadow about to engulf/attack the kid probably isn't the smartest choice. Talk about NEVER sleeping again.

The intro discussed the writer and her work with the disease. I believe she is amazing at what she does. I worry that this is written from a doctor's perspective, not from a parent or child who has it right now. It needs to be viewed in the eyes of a child. That's the most important thing. I wish Weiss, her patients, and family all the luck in the world, and I hope a new addition of this is a little more child friendly.

I had never heard of P.A.N.D.A.S (Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Streptococcus) before I read this book. I definitely feel I've been briefly educated on the subject, but I would not read this book to children unless, they were dealing with the illness (which is the reason the author wrote it) or if the child knew someone with the illness. It is hard to believe that all these symptoms result from the misdiagnosis of an infection. The illustrations and easy explanations in the story would certainly assist a child who was trying to understand what was happening to them or to their friend. I am so glad that this illness is curable as that gives a child hearing this hope. Told in such a non-threatening way, the illness seems much easier to deal with than I am sure it actually is, but it has a happy outcome. If I had a student in my class with this illness, this would be a great book to share with the classmates.
I also posted on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and 50 Book Pledge.