Medical Diseases

A coming-of-age memoir for modern times, Bleeder is the incredibly compelling tale of author Shelby Smoak. A hemophiliac, Smoak discovered he had been infected with HIV during a blood transfusion at the start of his college career. This devastating and destabilizing news led Smoak to see his world from an entirely new perspective, one in which life-threatening illness was perpetually just around the corner. Set in the 1990s along the North Carolina coast, Bleeder traces Smoak’s quest for love in a world that feels increasingly dangerous.

Life Blood, written by a renowned leukaemia physician, tells unforgettable stories of his leukaemia patients’ battles to be cured but also uniquely describes the stresses that doctors face when looking after extremely ill young people during an extraordinary time in their lives. In reflecting on his long and illustrious career, Professor Marks’ memoir offers frank descriptions of his own medical family, some personal experiences of ill-health and his relationships with colleagues and patients in the NHS. Partly written during the Covid pandemic and as he approached retirement, Life Blood offers highly informed and compassionate views on modern medicine, from a pivotal point in both the author’s own professional life and the history of healthcare.

A story about a doctor helping people suffering from mysterious conditions overcome hopeless situations Dr. Zachary Tannous has a history of working with high-level athletes of all kinds, specializing in enhancing physical performance, treating sports traumas, with a focus in neurology, autoimmune disease, and conditions of severe chronic pain. As an ex-collegiate football and semi-professional rugby player, Dr. Tannous knows about traumatic injury and physical performance from a first-hand perspective.

When you or someone you love is diagnosed with cancer it feels like your whole world is falling apart. Not knowing what will happen next is terrifying, and that is the main reason I wrote this book, hoping that my experience could help others. The first title of this book was, “My body is weak but my mind is strong”, starting out as a story about my personal battle with cancer, and that was the mantra I used to hype myself up before my final chemotherapy session.

Leaving a life marked by crippling setbacks and his father's doubt, in 1967 a 20-something doctor from India arrived in America with only five dollars and the desire to claim his American dream. Faced with an entirely new culture, racism, and the lasting effects of disabling childhood injuries, through hard work and perseverance he overcame all odds. Now having performed over 15,000 open-heart surgeries, more than nearly every surgeon in history, Dr. Singh reflects on his most memorable patients and his incredible personal life.

Straight out of today's hospitals and labs, and tomorrow's headlines, comes a frightening, scalpel-sharp thriller from medical insider Joshua Spanogle. In an astounding debut, Spanogle takes us on an all-too-real race against time as a young doctor enters the dark side of scientific research, desperate to stop a terrifying epidemic before it is too late.

Off Our Chests recounts the story of Liza and John’s experience with her diagnosis and treatment. Written in alternating voices, Liza details her treatment and the complex decisions she had to make throughout her course of chemotherapy and radiation, including clinical trial participation and an elective double mastectomy, with the added complexity of being treated at the cancer center of which John was the chief of hematology and oncology and dealing with the emotional impact of knowing she may die as a young woman with young children.

In Making Tough Decisions About End-of-Life Care in Dementia, Dr. Anne Kenny, a skilled palliative care physician, describes how to navigate the difficult journey of late-stage dementia with sensitivity, compassion, and common sense. Combining her personal experience caring for a mother with dementia with her medical expertise in both dementia and end-of-life care, Dr. Kenny helps the listener prepare for a family member's death while managing their own emotional health.

Following the trail of an unexpected family connection, acclaimed journalist Pam Fessler has unearthed the lost world of the patients, nurses, doctors, and researchers at Carville who struggled for over a century to eradicate Hansen's disease, the modern name for leprosy. Amid widespread public anxiety about foreign contamination and contagion, patients were deprived of basic rights - denied the right to vote, restricted from leaving Carville, and often forbidden from contact with their own parents or children.

If you have Lyme disease, you know firsthand the desperation that comes from being misdiagnosed, misunderstood, and misdirected. You need straight answers and real solutions, but all you get is the runaround. Riding high as a hard-driving entrepreneur in the solar industry, Taylor Nelson contracted Lyme disease in his mid-twenties. Spiraling down swiftly, he tried everything to feel like himself again, turning himself into a human guinea pig. Taylor shares his deeply personal story, what he tried, how it worked, and how to live a full life in the face of a devastating disease.

Bettina Greschner hat sich lange Zeit ihres Leben nicht erwünscht und nie gut genug gefühlt. Das Leben ging nicht gerade zimperlich mit ihr um. Aufgewachsen mit einem alkoholabhängigen Elternteil, der tödliche Verlust des Lebenspartners kurz vor der geplanten Hochzeit, 2011 die Diagnose "Brustkrebs" und zeitgleich die Selbständigkeit mit einem Möbelgeschäft, welche damals unter keinem guten Stern stand. Was nun? Warten bis es noch schlimmer wird und noch weiter bergab geht? Nein! Das war keine Option.

Leaving London to return home to rural South Wales, Robyn finds that it's her old life - same teddy bears resting on her pillow, their bodies tucked under the duvet; same view of the garages behind which she'd had her first cigarette and first kiss - but so much has changed. Her dad, the proud, charmingly intelligent self-made man who made people laugh, was in the grip of early onset Alzheimer's. His brilliant mind, which saw him building power stations and literally bringing light into the lives of others, had succumbed to darkness.

Hayley Okines is like no other 13-year-old schoolgirl. In Old Before My Time, Hayley and her mum, Kerry, reflect on her unusual life. Share Hayley’s excitement as she travels the world meeting her pop heroes Kylie, Girls Aloud, and Justin Bieber and her sadness as she loses her best friend to the disease at the age of 11. Now as she passes the age of 13 - the average life expectancy for a child with progeria - Hayley talks frankly about her hopes for the future and her pioneering drug trials in America which could unlock the secrets of ageing for everyone....

After suddenly being diagnosed with a rare form of aggressive cancer, I immediately started spiraling downward. Denial, loneliness, fear, depression, anger, and self-destructive behaviors. My life was a disaster. I was a mess. I was doing just about everything I was instructed not to. All sense of responsibility flew out the window, right along with my sense of morals. Further and further I slid into the deepest, darkest part of my life. I had come to terms with the fact that my life was over. I was going to die. Until I was rescued from not only cancer - but from myself.

Passados dois anos da publicação de seu primeiro livro, Enquanto eu respirar, a jornalista Ana Michelle Soares segue inteira na vida. Em 2011, aos 28 anos, ela foi diagnosticada com um câncer de mama. Aos 32, a doença voltou e atingiu outros órgãos, sem possibilidade de cura. Agora, entre tratamentos e remissões, ela busca o que realmente importa: o sentido de estar aqui. Nesta obra AnaMi se rende à liberdade de descobrir que um diagnóstico não se resume ao que dita a biologia. Com mais paixão do que nunca, ela fala apenas de vida.

"The best we can hope for you to live is 20 to 24 months...." That was the report given to Durell and Susan Tuberville by the physician who diagnosed Durell with stage four colorectal cancer. Durell and Susan were now faced with the question of how to live their final months together. How do you respond when faced with adversity in your own life? In this inspirational autobiography, you will hear about Durell's and Susan's decision to "live the miracle" rather than prepare for death. You will learn of the miracles of life that have given them success in their cancer journey.

Bauchweh oder Durchfall hat jeder mal. Aber was, wenn sie zum ständigen Begleiter werden und ein normaler Alltag kaum möglich ist, weil der Darm nicht mitspielt? Hunderttausende leiden allein in Deutschland an Colitis ulcerosa, einer chronischen Entzündung des Dickdarms. Einer von ihnen: TV-Star und Influencer Philipp Stehler. Nach Jahren des Verdrängens, des heimlichen Leidens und der ständigen Medikamenteneinnahme entschied sich der Frauenschwarm, mit dem Tabu zu brechen und offen über seine Krankheit zu sprechen.

Mysterious and misunderstood, distorted by biblical imagery of disfigurement and uncleanness, Hansen's disease or leprosy has all but disappeared from America's consciousness. In Carville, Louisiana, the closed doors of the nation's last center for the treatment of leprosy open to reveal stories of sadness, separation, and even strength in the face of what was once a life-wrenching diagnosis. Drawn from interviews with living patients and extensive research in the leprosarium's archives, Carville: Remembering Leprosy in America tells the stories of former patients.

Throughout history, there have been numerous epidemics that have threatened mankind with destruction. Diseases have the ability to highlight our shared concerns across the ages, affecting every social divide from national boundaries, economic categories, racial divisions, and beyond. Whether looking at smallpox, HIV, Ebola, or COVID-19 outbreaks, we see the same conversations arising as society struggles with the all-encompassing question: What do we do now?

Chet Tremaine is living his best life. A successful lawyer with a loyal best friend, the arts and culture of New York City at his doorstep, and a peaceful retreat in Connecticut, Chet has it figured out. Even when a freak tennis accident leaves him blind in one eye, Chet is confident he'll be able to bounce back. But then he starts hallucinating: unknown children playing in his living room, pine needles seasoning his salad, wire grids barring access to his bathroom. His doctor allays his worst fears, only to deliver an even more shocking diagnosis.