Friday, November 27, 2020

Brain on Fire - Susannah Cahalan

Sub-title: My Month of Madness

Recommended by my sister, this was a fascinating and terrifying read.  A young journalist starts acting strangely; paranoid, not sleeping, hallucinating and catatonic.  After weeks of unsuccessful treatment in the neurological floor of a New York hospital, she is finally diagnosed with anti-NMDA-receptor autoimmune encephalitis, an inflammation of the brain due to the over activity of the immune system.  

A rare condition whose treatment had only been determined a couple of years before her illness, she came out of the experience to write the story of the spiral into madness.  Fascinating and horrifying at the same time.  She points out that many who may have the condition are mis-diagnosed with schizophrenia and/or autism.  A good read and commentary on medical diagnosis as a skill as well as a science.

Published: 2012  Read: November 2020  Genre: Non-fiction

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