In Limbo Over Lyme Disease


Book Description

In Limbo Over Lyme Disease is about the journey of a teen with Lyme disease and co-infections, caused by the bite of a tick. If not caught early, Lyme disease and co-infections can become chronic and wreak havoc on a person's body, mind, and life. Early diagnosis and treatment are key to a successful recovery. Prevention is important for everyone, since ticks are found around the world.




Gone in a Heartbeat


Book Description

Spector, one of the nation's top oncologists, led a charmed life until it all came crashing down in 1994. He and his wife lost two unborn children. And a mysterious illness brought him to the brink of death. Here, he describes how he was misdiagnosed and, despite being a medical insider, was often discounted by his fellow physicians. Encouraging readers to never surrender their power to a third party, he advocates for educated patients who can make informed decisions collaboratively and not simply follow instructions.




The LDN Book


Book Description

Could a little-known drug really revolutionize treatment for autoimmune diseases, cancer, depression, and more? “[LDN] raises hopes of reversing memory loss in old age.”—the Guardian Over 30,000 copies sold! Low Dose Naltrexone (LDN) holds the potential to help millions of people suffering from various autoimmune diseases and cancers, and even autism, chronic fatigue, and depression, find relief. Administered off-label in small daily doses (0.5 to 4.5 mg), this generic drug is extremely affordable and presents few known side effects. So why has it languished in relative medical obscurity? The LDN Book explains: The drug’s origins Its primary mechanism The latest research from practicing physicians and pharmacists Compiled by Linda Elsegood of The LDN Research Trust—the world’s largest LDN charity organization with over 19,000 members worldwide—the book features ten chapters contributed by medical professionals on LDN’s efficacy and two patient-friendly appendices. The LDN Book is a comprehensive resource for doctors, pharmacists, and patients who want to learn more about how LDN is helping people now, and a clarion call for further research that could help millions more.




Nature Noir


Book Description

Smith chronicles his 14 years as a park ranger on a huge tract of government land in the Sierras, illuminating some startling truths about America's wild lands.




The Deep Places


Book Description

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • In this vulnerable, insightful memoir, the New York Times columnist tells the story of his five-year struggle with a disease that officially doesn’t exist, exploring the limits of modern medicine, the stories that we unexpectedly fall into, and the secrets that only suffering reveals. “A powerful memoir about our fragile hopes in the face of chronic illness.”—Kate Bowler, bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason In the summer of 2015, Ross Douthat was moving his family, with two young daughters and a pregnant wife, from Washington, D.C., to a sprawling farmhouse in a picturesque Connecticut town when he acquired a mysterious and devastating sickness. It left him sleepless, crippled, wracked with pain--a shell of himself. After months of seeing doctors and descending deeper into a physical inferno, he discovered that he had a disease which according to CDC definitions does not actually exist: the chronic form of Lyme disease, a hotly contested condition that devastates the lives of tens of thousands of people but has no official recognition--and no medically approved cure. From a rural dream house that now felt like a prison, Douthat's search for help takes him off the map of official medicine, into territory where cranks and conspiracies abound and patients are forced to take control of their own treatment and experiment on themselves. Slowly, against his instincts and assumptions, he realizes that many of the cranks and weirdos are right, that many supposed "hypochondriacs" are victims of an indifferent medical establishment, and that all kinds of unexpected experiences and revelations lurk beneath the surface of normal existence, in the places underneath. The Deep Places is a story about what happens when you are terribly sick and realize that even the doctors who are willing to treat you can only do so much. Along the way, Douthat describes his struggle back toward health with wit and candor, portraying sickness as the most terrible of gifts. It teaches you to appreciate the grace of ordinary life by taking that life away from you. It reveals the deep strangeness of the world, the possibility that the reasonable people might be wrong, and the necessity of figuring out things for yourself. And it proves, day by dreadful day, that you are stronger than you ever imagined, and that even in the depths there is always hope.




Taming Liquid Hydrogen


Book Description




Lyme Disease, Ticks and You


Book Description

Lyme disease has been steadily on the rise since the 1990s, and the threat of Lyme is only expected to grow as warmer global temperatures potentially prolong the tick season. In 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated there were 33,666 confirmed and probable cases of Lyme disease reported in the United States. The Government of Canada reported 1,487 cases that same year. Lyme, if not treated early, can develop into a debilitating disease, with symptoms that can be felt for months or even years. Lyme Disease, Ticks and You is an easy-to-follow and essential guide to understanding, detecting and treating Lyme and other tick-borne diseases. Dr. Shelley Ball, a trained freshwater insect ecologist, is a long-term Lyme sufferer who has been infected multiple times, including with various other tick-borne diseases. Drawing from years of experience advocating for her own health, Dr. Ball has gathered together the information and resources the reader needs to not only understand the science, prevent tick bites and recognize Lyme, but also get treatment for this complex and often misdiagnosed disease. Chapters include: Chapter 2: What You Need to Know about Ticks and Lyme Disease Chapter 3: A Brief Biology of Lyme Disease Chapter 4: How Can I Reduce the Risk of a Tick Bite? Chapter 5: What If I'm Bitten? Chapter 6: Treating Lyme and Co-Infections Lyme Disease, Ticks and You is capped off with an extensive list of references and resources that will further equip each reader with the information they need to deal with ticks, Lyme and other tick-borne diseases.




Putting a Name to It


Book Description

Finalist, Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness Book Prize, British Sociological Association Over a decade after medical sociologist Phil Brown called for a sociology of diagnosis, Putting a Name to It provides the first book-length, comprehensive framework for this emerging subdiscipline of medical sociology. Diagnosis is central to medicine. It creates social order, explains illness, identifies treatments, and predicts outcomes. Using concepts of medical sociology, Annemarie Goldstein Jutel sheds light on current knowledge about the components of diagnosis to outline how a sociology of diagnosis would function. She situates it within the broader discipline, lays out the directions it should explore, and discusses how the classification of illness and framing of diagnosis relate to social status and order. Jutel explains why this matters not just to doctor-patient relationships but also to the entire medical system. As a result, she argues, the sociological realm of diagnosis encompasses not only the ongoing controversy surrounding revisions to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in psychiatry but also hot-button issues such as genetic screening and pharmaceutical industry disease mongering. Both a challenge and a call to arms, Putting a Name to It is a lucid, persuasive argument for formalizing, professionalizing, and advancing longstanding practice. Jutel’s innovative, open approach and engaging arguments will find support among medical sociologists and practitioners and across much of the medical system.




Emergent Public Health Issues in the US-Mexico Border Region


Book Description

US-Mexico border region area has unique social, demographic and policy forces at work that shape the health of its residents as well as serves as a microcosm of migration health challenges facing an increasingly mobile and globalized world. This region reflects the largest migratory flow between any two nations in the world. Data from the Pew Research Center shows over the last 25 years there has never been lower than 140,000 annual immigrants from Mexico to the United States (with peaks over 700,000). This migratory route is extremely hazardous due to natural (e.g., arid and hot desert regions) and human made barriers as well as border enforcement practices tied to socio-political and geopolitical pressures. Also, reflecting the national interdependency of public health and human services needs, during the most recent five year period surveyed the migratory flow between the US and Mexico has equaled that of the flow of Mexico to the US--both around 1.4 million persons. Of particular public health concern, within the US-Mexico region of both nations there is among the highest disparities in income, education, infrastructure and access to health care--factors within the World Health Organization’s conceptualization of the Social Determinants of Health, and among the highest rates of chronic disease. For instance obesity and diabetes rates in this region are among the highest of those monitored in the world, with adult population estimates of the former over 40% and estimates in some population sub-groups for the latter over 20%. The publications reflected in this Research Topic, all reviewed from experts in the field, addressed many of the public health issues in the US Mexico Border Health Commission’s Healthy Border 2020 objectives. Those objectives-- broad public health goals used to guide a diverse range of government, research and community-based stakeholders--include Non Communicable Diseases (including adult and childhood obesity-related ones; cancer), Infectious Diseases (e.g., tuberculosis; HIV; emerging diseases--particularly mosquito borne illnesses), Maternal and Child Health, Mental Health Disorders, and Motor Vehicle Accidents. Other relevant public health issues affecting this region, for example environmental health, binational health services coordination (e.g., immunization), the impact of migration throughout the Americas and globally in this region, health issues related to the physical climate, access to quality health care, discrimination/mistreatment and well-being, acculturative/immigration stress, violence, substance use/abuse, oral health, respiratory disease, and well-being from a social determinants of health framework, are critical areas addressed in these publications or for future research. Each of these Research Topic publications presented applied solutions (e.g., new programs, technology or infrastructure) and/or public health policy recommendations relevant to each public health challenge addressed.




How to Be Sick


Book Description

This life-affirming, instructive, and thoroughly inspiring book is a must-read for anyone who is - or who might one day be - sick. It can also be the perfect gift of guidance, encouragement, and uplifting inspiration to family, friends, and loved ones struggling with the many terrifying or disheartening life changes that come so close on the heels of a diagnosis of a chronic condition or life-threatening illness. Authentic and graceful, How to be Sick reminds us of our limitless inner freedom, even under high degrees of suffering and pain. The author - who became ill while a university law professor in the prime of her career - tells the reader how she got sick and, to her and her partner's bewilderment, stayed that way. Toni had been a longtime meditator, going on long meditation retreats and spending many hours rigorously practicing, but soon discovered that she simply could no longer engage in those difficult and taxing forms. She had to learn ways to make "being sick" the heart of her spiritual practice - and through truly learning how to be sick, she learned how, even with many physical and energetic limitations, to live a life of equanimity, compassion, and joy. And whether we ourselves are ill or not, we can learn these vital arts from Bernhard's generous wisdom in How to Be Sick.