ABSTRACT
In the old days, people who died from diseases contracted them quickly, reached crisis shortly thereafter, and either died or pulled through. Modem medical researchers have changed this dramatic pattern by taming many once-devastating ailments. Some chronic diseases carry a constant threat of grave medical crises. Disease which are stigmatizing are kept as secret as possible. During the last phases of a disease trajectory, an unbridgeable gap may open up between previously intimate spouses. Friends and relatives may withdraw from patients who are making excessive demands or who have undergone personality changes caused by a crisis or the progress of a disease. The chief business of a chronically ill person is not just to stay alive or to keep his symptoms under control, but to live as normally as possible despite his symptoms and his disease. Helping those afflicted with chronic diseases means far more than simply displaying compassion or having medical competence.
