Monday, November 30, 2009

Cancer Is a Word Not a Sentence or The Roots of Desire

Cancer Is a Word, Not a Sentence: A Practical Guide to Help You through the First Few Weeks

Author: Robert Buckman


A trusted and essential companion for everyone dealing with a diagnosis of cancer.

"If you're reading this book, you're probably reeling... This book is going to do one specific thing for you: it's going to help you get your balance back."

-from the introduction

Cancer is a Word, Not a Sentence is a practical guide written for people who have just been diagnosed with cancer. It aims to help them -- and their loved ones -- make sense of what happens next and to plan a course of action. Dr. Robert Buckman describes everything that comes after the diagnosis, including tests, the stages of the disease, treatment options and follow-up.

Having treated patients and interacted with their families for years, Dr. Buckman presents a six-step plan that provides information needed to make important choices in seeking the best treatment:


  • Communicating with the medical team

  • Treatment options and their pros and cons

  • The right questions to ask and where to get information

  • The decisions the patient has to make

  • The possible outcomes.



Dr. Buckman also focuses on daily life: how to talk to your spouse or children, how to break the news to friends, and how to obtain the information you need. There's also a section addressed to family and friends who "just don't know what to say."

In simple and straightforward language, this practical book provides a guide for use in the real world.



Table of Contents:

Introduction: A Word, Not a Sentence

Part One: "What's Going to Happen to Me Next?"

A Step-by-Step Guide

Part Two: "What's Treatment Like?"

How Cancer Is Treated

Part Three: "Isn't There an Easier Way?"

Complementary Medicine and Remedies

Part Four: "How Do I Get Back on Track?"

Living Your Life

Part Five: "Do I Always Have to Have a Positive Attitude?"

Cancer and the Mind

Part Six: "What Can I Do to Help Myself?"

Gaining More Control

Appendix A: Tables

Appendix B: "Where Can I Get More Help?"

A Directory of Organizations, Sources and Web sites

Acknowledgements
Index

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The Roots of Desire: The Myth, Meaning, and Sexual Power of Red Hair

Author: Marion Roach

Part history, part cultural commentary, part memoir, The Roots of Desire is a witty and entertaining investigation into what it means to be a redhead.

A redhead rarely goes unnoticed in a crowded room. From Judas Iscariot to Botticelli's Venus to Julianne Moore, redheads have been worshipped, idealized, fetishized, feared, and condemned, leaving their mark on us and our culture. Such is the power of what is actually a genetic mutation, and in The Roots of Desire, Marion Roach takes a fascinating look at the science behind hair color and the roles redheads have played over time. She discovers that in Greek mythology, redheads become vampires after they die; Hitler banned intermarriage with redheads for fear of producing "deviant offspring"; women with red hair were burned as witches during the Inquisition; in Hollywood, female redheads are considered sexy while male redheads are considered a hard sell; and in the nineteenth century, it was popular belief that redheads were the strongest scented of all women, smelling of amber and violets. Redheads have been stereotyped, marginalized, sought after, and made to function as everything from a political statement to a symbol of human carnality. A redhead herself, Roach brings candor and brilliant insight to the complicated and revealing history of redheads, making this a stand-out narrative and an essential tool in understanding the mechanics and phenomenon of red hair.

Publishers Weekly

A redhead herself, NPR commentator Roach has an odd chip on her shoulder about it, relating all sorts of travails and opinions connected to red hair that the average non-redhead may never have guessed existed. To get to the bottom of our perceptions and experience of red hair, she explores the ancient legends of Lilith and Set, the traditions that depict both Judas and Mary Magdalene as redheads, and an Eve in London's St. Paul's Cathedral that has blond hair before the Fall and red hair after it. She visits "witch camp" in Vermont, a high-end hair salon in Manhattan, and Emily Dickinson's house, where a carefully preserved lock of the poet's red hair transforms Roach's image of her. Along the way, Roach (Another Name for Madness) makes some poignant points about what it means to belong to the redheaded minority in Western society, making gently suggestive comparisons to more overt patterns of prejudice. Yet the author seems to accept preconceptions about the sexuality and vivacity associated with red hair, and her jumping between examples often reads more like breathless conjecture than fact and leaches energy from extended vignettes, such as her visit with the witches. Whether readers enjoy this book will have a lot to do with whether they like the narrator's self-conscious red-headed persona. And, of course, whether they are as fascinated as she is by red hair. Agent, Kris Dahl. (July) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus

"Roach approaches her subject from several angles, providing much that's entertaining."

Library Journal

NPR commentator Roach (Dead Reckoning: The New Science of Catching Killers) sets out to affirm the uniqueness of a small elite: redheads. She visits a witch camp, a genetics laboratory, the Victorian graveyard of her ancestors, and Amherst, MA, where she sees the only existing lock of Emily Dickinson's hair. By book's end, she has left blondes and brunettes sputtering in the dust of the world's most powerful, sexy, and satanic women-natural redheads like Roach herself. Along the way, she pulls together history, myth, symbolism, etymology, personal memoir, science writing, and some piquant facts to explore and, some may argue, bolster the significance of red hair. The section "Sinners" associates red hair with Satan (a.k.a. Set) through such figures as Judas, Henry VIII, Boudicca, and Shakespeare's Shylock. (This is the only section that really encompasses male redheads.) In "Science," Roach travels to Edinburgh, redhead capital of the world, to have her own genetic test done. She discovers that she indeed carries the genetic sequencing that creates a typical redhead. The final section, "Sex," looks into the Garden of Eden as depicted in mosaics in London's St. Paul's Cathedral and chronicles Eve's transformation from blond (pre- Original Sin) to redhead (post-Original Sin). Redhead stereotypes of women-powerful, sin-stained, pleasure-seeking, prone to "bad girl" behavior-abound in this section. Lest other hair colors feel left out, there is always Clairol: according to Roach, red is the number-one choice for hair color. A strong recommendation for redheads; a toned-down recommendation for academic and general collections.-Janet Sassi, New York Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.



Saturday, November 28, 2009

Suffer the Child or The Changing Brain

Suffer the Child: How the Health Care System Is Failing Our Future

Author: Lidia Wasowicz Pringl

Antidepressants causing adolescents to commit suicide? Vaccines triggering autism in healthy babies? Stimulants creating a nation of cookie-cutter children? Old cures leading to epidemics of chronic disease? Suffer the Child digs beneath the headlines to expose a health care system burdened with uncertainties and sagging with shortfalls that are shortchanging our children's health.

Based on a 15-part UPI series and written by an award-winning investigative reporter who interviewed more than 200 physicians, policymakers, parents, children's advocates, educators, drug developers, public health, and medical specialists, "Suffer the Child" looks at all the challenges affecting our childrenâЂ™s health, from a failing health care system to an epidemic of new problems like autism and obesity. More importantly, it examines ways we can overcome them, as most of the experts agree that a massive multi-faceted campaign is called for.

More than in any previous generation, today's parents must be proactive in protecting and promoting their child's health. This book is their comprehensive reference to the issues we face in caring for our childrenâЂ™s health and the system we once trusted to protect and cure them.

Topics include: emergency care standards, ADHD, alternative remedies, antidepressants, boys, causes of mental problems, causes of physical problems, diagnosis of mental problems, drug monitoring, drug safety and effectiveness, drug side effects, ethical questions, girls, infectious disease, medical errors, mental health screening and statistics, mixing medicines, off-label drug use, OTC drugs, pharmaceutical company conduct,policies and protocols, prevention of mental ailments, prevention of physical ailments, psychotropic drugs, research, safety issues in hospitals, stimulants, treatment of mental ailments, treatment of physical ailments, vaccines.



Table of Contents:
Introduction The Picture of Imperfect Health     ix
Examining the Range of the Symptoms
Child Health USA: The Good, the Bad, and the Undetermined     3
Tallying Up the Chronic Illness Tab     13
Young Minds Under Attack     19
Attention on Deficits     31
A Real Downer     71
Extracting the Roots of the Sickness
Getting to the Cause of Illness     115
Eye on Autism: A Backward Glance     123
Eye on Autism: Facing Facts     169
Eye on Autism: Looking Forward     197
Evaluating the Remedies for the Suffering
What's in a Label?     221
Words from the Wise     283
Epilogue Three Cs for Success     299
Appendices
Milestones to Remember     311
Triumphs and Challenges     313
Childhood Ills by the Numbers     317
Childhood Deaths by the Numbers     321
Diagnostic Criteria for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder     323
International Consensus Statement on ADHD     327
Diagnostic Criteria for Major Depressive Episode     337
Diagnostic Criteria for Pervasive Developmental Disorders     339
Vaccine-Specific Information     343
Questions and Response     349
Notes     355
Index     424
About the Author     434

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The Changing Brain: Alzheimer's Disease and Advances in Neuroscience

Author: IRA B Black

In The Changing Brain, Ira Black tells the fascinating story of modern neuroscience. A rich, multifaceted tale spanning a century and taking place on multiple continents, it moves from Fascist Italy, with the discovery of nerve growth factor (NGF) by a young scientist working secretly in a makeshift laboratory in her bedroom, to current experiments in which transplanted, laboratory-grown cells lead to recovery and function in damaged brain regions. In the mid 1990s, a revolutionary new conception of the brain emerged--instead of the traditional view that the brain's role in perception, memory, learning, and emotions was based on a static, non-renewable network of brain cells and connections, research revealed that the human brain is an ever-changing, fantastically complex system that is continually being shaped and reshaped by a subtle interplay of genetic clues and life experiences.

To bridge the gap between abstract concepts and real-world experience, Dr. Black draws upon his expertise as a clinical neurologist to provide a dramatic account--the fictionalized story of a successful investment banker named Enoch Wallace and his battle with Alzheimer's disease--that vividly illuminates the narrative. From his first fleeting memory lapses to his final descent into dementia, each step in Wallace's decline becomes a window into another aspect of brain function and the latest groundbreaking research in neuroscience.


"An intriguing scientific thriller that, like all good thrillers, weaves multiple plots....The parallel telling of clinical and scientific tales at its best breathes life, personality and clinical relevance into the neuroscience."--NatureNeuroscience

"Black probes the horror of brain disease, scrutinizing the cellular dynamics that trigger it and surveying the therapies used to combat it. But the scientific analysis of synaptic failure does not obscure the human pathos: a poignant account of one man's descent into the Alzheimer's abyss serves as the narrative thread for the whole book and lends emotional resonance to Black's biochemistry."--Booklist

"Dr. Black is the ideal guide to lead us through the bewildering story behind the recent revolution in neuroscience. We are at the dawn of a new age of the brain and the central nervous system that is nothing short of miraculous. Dr. Black is an inspired physician, an inspired writer, and his book is an inspiration to us all." --Christopher Reeve