THE FAMILY THAT COULDN'T SLEEP: A MEDICAL MYSTERY, by D. T. Max, Random House, 299 pages, $25.95
The author of "The Family That Couldn't Sleep," a fascinating medical mystery, is D.T. Max, who has impressive writing credits from the New York Times Magazine and several prominent newspapers.
The author has performed a penetrating analysis of his mountain of research into mysterious diseases that threaten health worldwide, many of which have been around for centuries.
Max has unique credentials for his subject: He too suffers from a mysterious ailment, a slowly progressing neuromuscular disease. It started in his 20s when his left foot began to drag. Then he felt the ground shifting and his problem became one of balance. Eventually he was wearing plastic braces, which were hard to put on as his hands also weakened.
His longest nerves, from the base of the spine all the way to his feet and up to his arms, were malfunctioning. They had lost the ability to communicate with corresponding muscles. Essentially, his nerves are OK, but "the scaffolding that holds them together is malformed. The problem is not the telephone wires but the poles."
Although Max explains or touches on a number of strange diseases in this book, he puts the majority of his time on a fatal familial insomnia that strikes a person in his/her 50s and kills by depriving the victim of sleep.
When we think of insomnia, we think of the more common malady that strikes a number of people but is treatable and will not kill you. FFI is an important exception. Max's research suggests that going completely without sleep weakens the brain and the body so much that the victim can barely function — and it is a horrible way to die.
The people who get this dreadful disease belong to an Italian family that dates back centuries. A child of a parent with FFI has a 50 percent chance of getting it. Once the disease strikes, it takes about 15 months to weaken and kill its victim.
Max has done enough research and spoken personally with enough members of this family that he writes from knowledge. He has attended reunions of the family who are interested in collecting as much information relating to the disease as they can.
Reading this book provides convincing evidence that medical science is far from reaching its full potential; there are just too many unanswered questions and unexplained maladies — some of which you and I probably have.
E-mail: dennis@desnews.com