20th century
A01=Ross A Slotten
Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
aids
american history
Author_Ross A Slotten
autobiography
automatic-update
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=BGT
Category=DNBT
Category=JBSJ
Category=JFSK
Category=MJCJ2
chicago
COP=United States
crisis
death
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
disease
doctor
dying
epidemic
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
family practitioners
gay
gender studies
health
healthcare
historical
hiv positive
hivaids
homosexuality
IL
illinois
illness
Language_English
lgbtq
lgbtqia
medical community
medicine
memoir
notebooks
PA=Available
patients
personal account
Price_€20 to €50
professional
PS=Active
reflection
softlaunch
treatment
united states of america
Product details
- ISBN 9780226718767
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 15 Jul 2020
- Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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In 1992, Dr. Ross A. Slotten had the dubious distinction of signing more death certificates in the city of Chicago--and, by inference, the state of Illinois--than any other physician. As a family physician, he trained to care for patients from birth to death, but when he completed his residency in 1984, he had no idea that many of his future patients would be cut down in the prime of their lives. Among those patients were close friends, colleagues, and former lovers, who were shunned by most of the medical community because of their sexual orientation and HIV-positive status. Slotten wasn't an infectious disease specialist, but because of his unique position as a gay man and a young physician, he became an unlikely pioneer, swept up in the maelstrom of one of the greatest epidemics in modern human history.
In Plague Years, Slotten offers a unique first-person account of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, drawing from private journals and notes from his thirty-plus years of practice. Spanning not just the city of Chicago, but four continents as well, Plague Years provides a comprehensive portrait of the epidemic, from its mystery-riddled early years through the reckless governmental responses of the United States and other nations that led to legions of senseless deaths and ruined lives to the discoveries of life-saving drug cocktails that transformed the disease into something potentially manageable. Unlike most other books on the subject, Slotten's story extends to the present day, when prevention of infection for those at risk and successful treatment of those already infected offer a ray of hope that HIV/AIDS can be stopped in its tracks.
Alternating between Slotten's reactions to the crisis as a gay man and the demanding toll the disease took on his career and the world around him, Plague Years sheds light on some of the darkest hours in the history of the LGBT community in a way that no previous medical memoir has.
Ross A. Slotten is a family practitioner specializing in the care of people with HIV/AIDS. He lives in Chicago with his partner and is the author of The Heretic in Darwin's Court: The Life of Alfred Russel Wallace.
