The Encyclopedia of HIV And AIDS

The Encyclopedia of HIV And AIDS (Facts on File Library of Health and Living)
by Stephen E. Stratton (Author), Sarah Barbara Watstein (Author)

Product Details
* Hardcover: 660 pages
* Publisher: Facts on File; 2 edition (September 2003)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0816048088

Book Description
This is the second edition of a 1998 work titled The AIDS Dictionary. As with the earlier edition, there are several thousand A-Z entries, and the territory covered is enormous. Included is a wide array of topics--medical, cultural, social, personal, and pharmacological.

Changes include both new entries and revisions to existing entries. Abacavir is an example of an entry that has been updated. This is a powerful pharmaceutical agent that was headed for FDA approval for use with HIV patients in 1998, the year the first edition was published. In the 1998 entry, concern was expressed about the efficacy of the drug in patients who had already been prescribed other courses of treatment for HIV. Fears of its potential side effects, including anaphylactic reactions in a small percentage of patients, were also described. In the new entry those concerns and fears are both confirmed; however, abacavir's very positive uses are also discussed, as its benefits have emerged over time. Another revised entry, Pregnancy, is some six paragraphs long in The AIDS Dictionary. In The Encyclopedia, it has grown to multiple pages with subheadings such as "Pregnancy and HIV Disease," "HIV-Infected Babies," "Prevention and Treatment," "Knowledge of HIV Transmission," and "Reproductive Rights and Testing."
Aside from the entries, The Encyclopedia contains appendixes of value to both librarian and library user alike. The first offers more than 100 "Frequently Used Abbreviations." The second provides many pages of statistics on HIV/AIDS in the U.S. The third appendix provides worldwide HIV/AIDS statistics by country, and the fourth includes selected resources: telephone listings, education sources for physicians, clinical trial information, publications, databases, and Web sites from around the world. An extensive bibliography and index round out this excellent resource. The Encyclopedia of HIV and AIDS is recommended for health collections in academic, public, and medical libraries.

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The Immune Response: Basic and Clinical Principles

The Immune Response: Basic and Clinical Principles
by Tak W. Mak (Author), Mary Saunders (Author)

Product Details
* Hardcover: 1216 pages
* Publisher: Academic Press; 1 edition (September 27, 2005)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0120884518

Book Description
"The Immune Response is a well-written, well-organized, learner-centered text that is suitable for undergraduates, medical and graduate students, and more advanced learners of immunology."

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How the Cows Turned Mad: Unlocking the Mysteries of Mad Cow Disease

How the Cows Turned Mad: Unlocking the Mysteries of Mad Cow Disease
by Maxime Schwartz (Author), Edward Schneider (Translator)

Product Details
* Paperback: 256 pages
* Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (September 13, 2004)
* Language: English
* ISBN-10: 0520243374

Book Description:
Fear of mad cow disease, a lethal illness transmitted from infected beef to humans, has spread from Europe to the United States and around the world. Originally published to much acclaim in France, this scientific thriller, available in English for the first time and updated with a new chapter on developments in 2001, tells of the hunt for the cause of an enigmatic class of fatal brain infections, of which mad cow disease is the latest incarnation. In gripping, nontechnical prose, Maxime Schwartz details the deadly manifestations of these diseases throughout history, describes the major players and events that led to discoveries about their true nature, and outlines our current state of knowledge. The book concludes by addressing the question we all want answered: should we be afraid?
The story begins in the eighteenth century with the identification of a mysterious illness called scrapie that was killing British sheep. It was not until the 1960s that scientists understood that several animal and human diseases, including scrapie, were identical, and together identified them as transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE). The various guises assumed throughout history by TSE include an illness called kuru in a cannibalistic tribe in Papua New Guinea, an infectious disease that killed a group of children who had been treated for growth hormone deficiencies, and mad cow disease. Revealing the fascinating process of scientific discovery that led to our knowledge of TSE, Schwartz relates pivotal events in the history of biology, including the Pasteurian revolution, the birth of genetics, the emergence of molecular biology, and the latest developments in biotechnology. He also explains the Nobel Prize-winning prion hypothesis, which has rewritten the rules of biological heredity and is a key link between the distinctive diseases of TSE.

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