The Cancer Chronicles -- Unlocking Medicine's Deepest Mystery by George Johnson
Cancer is a disease that little progress has been made in treating -- let alone curing. With heart bypass surgeries, artery stents, valve replacements, disease of the heart is not the killer it once was. Antibiotics are able to cure (in most cases) bacterial infections that might result in death.
Cancer continues to kill about the same number (age adjusted) of people that it did 50 years ago. Cancer has been around a long time. It was found in the bones of dinosaurs. As Johnson does his research speaking with cancer experts and researchers from around the world, he details what is known about cancer and what remains unknown.
The author also details the operation of chemotherapy and radiation used to destroy the cancer tumors. The therapy search by drug companies continues for treatments that will truly impact the cure rates of cancer.
The information in the book helped me to better understand the disease and the difficulty in finding a cure. The treatments and therapies are almost as bad as the disease. On that less than happy thought, the book gave me pause to consider what I might do when faced with a doctor telling me, "You've got cancer."
Caveat. The interest in reading a book about cancer was curiosity and learning. There may be some cancer lurking in this body. If there is one, it is unknown and unfound.
There are other books about cancer available. However, when I was searching for a book about cancer, this was one of those that I could borrow as an ebook from a library.
Sunday, November 10, 2013
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I'm going to look for this one. Thanks for the review, cancer is a probability for me now that I have Barrett's Syndrome due to GERD and I should know more about treatment. I know your odds increase drastically the sooner they catch it but otherwise am not sure what current statistics are regarding the efficacy of chemo.
ReplyDeleteHey Llloyd, have you hooked up with the monthly free ebooks from University of Chicago Press? http://press.uchicago.edu/books/freeEbook.html. They're a wide ranging bunch of topics, mostly non-fiction which should appeal to you. I like your book reviews.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link. I'll check it out.
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