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Allergic : our irritated bodies in a changing world / Theresa MacPhail.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New York : Random House, [2023]Copyright date: ©2023Edition: First editionDescription: xx, 344 pages : illustration ; 25 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9780593229194
  • 0593229193
Subject(s):
Contents:
Prologue: Everything that irritates us -- Part one Diagnosis. What allergy is (and isn't) -- How allergy diagnosis works (or doesn't) -- Our allergic world : measuring the rise of allergic disease -- Part two Theories. Allergic inheritance : allergies as a "normal" immune response -- Nature out of whack -- Are we doing this to ourselves? The modern lifestyle and allergy -- Part three Treatments. Remedies for the irritated : allergy treatments past, present, and future -- The booming business of allergy treatments -- What makes a treatment effective? Weighing benefits and risks -- Irritating ourselves to death : allergy in the time of COVID-19.
Summary: "Hay fever. Peanut allergies. Eczema. Either you have a frustrating allergy, or you know someone who does. Billions of people worldwide--an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the global population--have some form of allergy; millions have one severe enough to actively endanger their health. Even more concerningly, over the last decade, the number of people diagnosed with allergy has been steadily increasing. Medical anthropologist Theresa MacPhail, herself an allergy sufferer whose father died of a bee sting, set out to understand why. This book is a holistic examination of the phenomenon of allergies from its first medical description in 1819 to the mind-bending recent development of biologics and immunotherapies that are giving the most severely impacted patients hope. In pursuit of this story, Theresa spent time with hundreds of experts, patients and activists: she scaled a roof with an air quality controller who diligently counts pollen by hand for hours every day; met a mother struggling to use WIC benefits for her daughter with severe food allergies; shadowed doctors at some of the finest allergy clinics in the world; and discussed the intersecting problems of climate change, pollution, and pollen with biologists who study seasonal respiratory allergies"-- Provided by publisher.
Holdings
Item type Home library Collection Call number Materials specified Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Adult Book Adult Book Dr. James Carlson Library NonFiction 616.973 M172 Available 33111011062870
Adult Book Adult Book Main Library NonFiction 616.973 M172 Available 33111011282437
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

An "important and deeply researched" ( The Wall Street Journal ) exploration of allergies, from their first medical description in 1819 to the cutting-edge science that is illuminating the changes in our environment and lifestyles that are making so many of us sick

Hay fever. Peanut allergies. Eczema. Either you have an allergy or you know someone who does. Billions of people worldwide--an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the global population--have some form of allergy. Even more concerning, over the last decade the number of people diagnosed with an allergy has been steadily increasing, placing an ever-growing medical burden on individuals, families, communities, and healthcare systems.

Medical anthropologist Theresa MacPhail, herself an allergy sufferer whose father died of a beesting, set out to understand why. In pursuit of answers, MacPhail studied the dangerous experiments of early immunologists as well as the mind-bending recent development of biologics and immunotherapies that are giving the most severely impacted patients hope. She scaled a roof with an air-quality controller who diligently counts pollen by hand for hours every day; met a mother who struggled to use WIC benefits for her daughter with severe food allergies; spoke with doctors at some of the finest allergy clinics in the world; and discussed the intersecting problems of climate change, pollution, and pollen with biologists who study seasonal respiratory allergies.

This is the story of allergies: what they are, why we have them, and what that might mean about the fate of humanity in a rapidly changing world.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 299-323) and index.

Prologue: Everything that irritates us -- Part one Diagnosis. What allergy is (and isn't) -- How allergy diagnosis works (or doesn't) -- Our allergic world : measuring the rise of allergic disease -- Part two Theories. Allergic inheritance : allergies as a "normal" immune response -- Nature out of whack -- Are we doing this to ourselves? The modern lifestyle and allergy -- Part three Treatments. Remedies for the irritated : allergy treatments past, present, and future -- The booming business of allergy treatments -- What makes a treatment effective? Weighing benefits and risks -- Irritating ourselves to death : allergy in the time of COVID-19.

"Hay fever. Peanut allergies. Eczema. Either you have a frustrating allergy, or you know someone who does. Billions of people worldwide--an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the global population--have some form of allergy; millions have one severe enough to actively endanger their health. Even more concerningly, over the last decade, the number of people diagnosed with allergy has been steadily increasing. Medical anthropologist Theresa MacPhail, herself an allergy sufferer whose father died of a bee sting, set out to understand why. This book is a holistic examination of the phenomenon of allergies from its first medical description in 1819 to the mind-bending recent development of biologics and immunotherapies that are giving the most severely impacted patients hope. In pursuit of this story, Theresa spent time with hundreds of experts, patients and activists: she scaled a roof with an air quality controller who diligently counts pollen by hand for hours every day; met a mother struggling to use WIC benefits for her daughter with severe food allergies; shadowed doctors at some of the finest allergy clinics in the world; and discussed the intersecting problems of climate change, pollution, and pollen with biologists who study seasonal respiratory allergies"-- Provided by publisher.

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