1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910790678703321

Autore

Lock Margaret M.

Titolo

The Alzheimer Conundrum : Entanglements of Dementia and Aging / / Margaret Lock

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Princeton : , : Princeton University Press, , 2016

©2016

ISBN

0-691-16847-4

1-4008-4846-6

Edizione

[Course Book]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (323 p.)

Disciplina

362.1968/31

Soggetti

Older people - Mental health

Brain - Aging - Molecular aspects

Alzheimer's disease - Age factors

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Originally published: 2013.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Acknowledgments -- Orientations -- Making and remaking Alzheimer disease -- Striving to standardize Alzheimer disease -- Paths to Alzheimer prevention -- Embodied risk made visible -- Alzheimer genes: biomarkers of prediction and prevention -- Genome-wide association studies: back to the future -- Living with embodied omens -- Chance untamed and the return of fate -- Transcending entrenched tensions -- Portraits from the mind -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.

Sommario/riassunto

Due to rapidly aging populations, the number of people worldwide experiencing dementia is increasing, and the projections are grim. Despite billions of dollars invested in medical research, no effective treatment has been discovered for Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia. The Alzheimer Conundrum exposes the predicaments embedded in current efforts to slow down or halt Alzheimer's disease through early detection of pre-symptomatic biological changes in healthy individuals. Based on a meticulous account of the history of Alzheimer's disease and extensive in-depth interviews, Margaret Lock highlights the limitations and the dissent associated with biomarker detection. Lock argues that basic research must continue, but should be complemented by a public health



approach to prevention that is economically feasible, more humane, and much more effective globally than one exclusively focused on an increasingly harried search for a cure.