Forgetting: Alzheimer's: Portrait of an Epidemic

Title: Forgetting: Alzheimer's: Portrait of an Epidemic
Author: David Shenk
ISBN: 9780385498371
Publisher: Doubleday
Published: 2001
Binding: Hardcover
Language: English
Edition: 1
Number of Pages: 304
Section: Health & Fitness | Diseases & Conditions | Nervous System (Incl. Brain)
Publisher Description: The Forgetting is David Shenk's scrupulously researched, multilayered account of the disease that afflicts nearly half of all persons over the age of eighty-five, insidiously robbing its victims of their memories and devastating the lives of their loved ones.

Alzheimer's is now at the forefront of many medical and scientific agendas, for as the world's population ages, the disease will affect millions besides the elderly. Shenk discusses some of the promising advances in understanding and combating Alzheimer's and movingly captures its impact on the many caught within its grasp. But just as he looks ahead at the possibilities of treatments and vaccines, Shenk looks back through history, exploring how Alzheimer's most likely afflicted such figures as Jonathan Swift, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Willem de Kooning. The result is a searing, powerful, and ultimately engaging account of the disease that will become a lead health issue for our aging population.