The Forgetting: Alzheimers: Portrait of an Epidemic
by By Shenk, David
Category: Health & Fitness , Health Care Issues

NATIONAL BESTSELLERA powerfully engaging, scrupulously researched, and deeply empathetic narrative of the history of Alzheimer’s disease, how it affects us, and the search for a cure.Afflicting nearly half of all people over the age of 85, Alzheimer’s disease kills   nearly 100,000 Americans a year as it insidiously robs them of their memory and wreaks   havoc on the lives of their loved ones. It was once minimized and misunderstood as   forgetfulness in the elderly, but Alzheimer’s is now at the forefront of many medical   and scientific agendas, for as the world’s population ages, the disease will touch the lives of virtually everyone. David Shenk movingly captures the disease’s   impact on its victims and their families, and he looks back through history, explaining   how Alzheimer’s most likely afflicted such figures as Jonathan Swift, Ralph Waldo   Emerson, and Willem de Kooning. The result is a searing and graceful account   of Alzheimer’s disease, offering a sobering, compassionate, and ultimately encouraging   portrait.