Zaboravljanje (Alzheimerova bolest: bolest jedne epidemije)

David Shenk provides a comparative account of the history of research into the disease, from the beginning of the 20th century when it was named after Dr. Alois Alzheimer, who was the first to discover organic changes (nodules and plaques) in the brain of a fifty-year-old patient, as well as the symptoms and clinical course: memory loss, spatial disorientation and increasing confusion. After the diagnosis, the average survival time is about eight years, and in less than fifty years it is assumed that in developed countries there will no longer be a person who will not be affected by this disease in some way. This work full of humanity and compassion is not only a depiction of the dramas that begin to play out in the families of patients; it brings to the stage doctors and scientists, brainy nurses, politicians faced with conflicting decisions, as well as the patients themselves with their moving stories: Wald Emerson, Mark Twain, Ronald Reagan and many more unknowns.