Neurogenetic Diagnoses

<p>As world populations continue to age the incidence of very common ultimately fatal neurodegenerative diseases (some of medicine’s most puzzling illnesses) will increase exponentially. <em>Neurogenetic Diagnoses the Power of Hope and the Limits of Today’s Medicine </em>explores the diverse impacts and intense meanings of genetic diagnoses for patients suffering from such diseases and for their family caregivers and clinicians. Through richly-textured often heart-wrenching longitudinal case studies <em>Neurogenetic Diagnoses...</em> reveals how extremely difficult it can be for patients to obtain a definitive diagnosis for the cause of their symptoms even with genetic testing; how with or without definitive diagnoses patients and family caregivers strive to come to terms with their situations; and how they are aided (or not) in these endeavors by their doctors. The analysis is framed by increasingly sharp social debate over the consequences of decoding the human genome -- and the impact of genetic technology on our lives. </p>