Emerging Diseases

Patients at the crossroads of new diseases and chronic ills.

Pamela Weintraub is a senior editor at Discover magazine and author of Cure Unknown: Inside the Lyme Epidemic. See full bio

January 2, 2009

When physicians miss the diagnosis, patients can be stigmatized with psychiatric labels (Neurogical Lyme Disease, Part Two)

Adults lost homes and jobs. Children lost their childhoods when cognitive or emotional disabilities forced them to be home-schooled, sometimes for years. The impact was major, but mainstream experts continued to characterize their symptoms as "minor," "nonspecific," and "vague." Read More

December 30, 2008

Shadowland of the Mind (Neurological Lyme Disease , Part One)

The first time I met a group of severely disabled Lyme disease patients I spent hours listening to their stories, some of them heartbreaking, and mourned, with them, their lives of frustration and pain. A month later, when I met the same patients again, several could not recall me. At first I was insulted. Had I been that forgettable, my empathy that banal? Read More

December 22, 2008

Through the Looking Glass

For years my family suffered the indignity and pain of undiagnosed Lyme disease in the hyperinfested, uninformed hamlet of Chappaqua in Westchester County, New York. Part 3 of 3 Read More

December 18, 2008

Paradise Lost

It's easy to see why we had such a cavalier, even reckless, attitude toward the environment, and why, at first, we chalked Jason's flu, cough, and joint aches up to ordinary childhood ills. Our pediatricians at the Mount Kisco Medical Group, northern Westchester's largest medical practice, said all of it was routine. We were concerned in 1995, with the onset of shooting pains through Jason's arms and legs, but the doctors said these "growing pains" were normal. Read More

December 16, 2008

Into the Woods

In the months ahead you can look to this space for discussion of real diseases diminished or dismissed by the medical establishment and the courageous patients and doctors who fight to be heard. Week after week, I'll open a window wide on the Read More