AGING WITH GRACE: What the Nun Study Teaches Us About Leading Longer, Healthier, and More Meaningful Lives
David Snowdon, Ph.D.
Bantam
Nonfiction
ISBN: 0553801635

For the past 15 years, the School Sisters of Notre Dame in Mankato, Minnesota, have been an army of volunteers as a part of a study on Alzheimer's disease. Their personal and medical histories have been made available to the remarkable and empathetic researcher who began the study in 1986 after performing similar medical studies with other religious groups. Professor David Snowdon theorized that religious orders are an excellent resource for medical research because often the diets, living habits, and insularity of these groups provide the control needed for accurate observation.  

The School Sisters, who ranged in age from 75 to 104, were approached to participate in the study and agreed to donate their brain tissue after their deaths. This generosity was indicative of the lives these quiet, dedicated women led --- it exemplified their desire to serve others in life and after. At the outset, Snowdon decided to break the barrier usually erected during research of this sort and became personally involved with the School Sisters over the course of the study, which is still ongoing. He made a commitment to treat them with "care and respect" and only divulge information they were willing to share. This unusual decision has led to a remarkable book, filled with insight that goes beyond charts and graphs, facts and figures.

One of the most striking discoveries was the correlation between a low rate of Alzheimer's and a high ability in written and oral expression. Snowdon was fortunate to find essays describing their home lives, written by the women while in their late teens as an exercise conducted upon entry into the order. Those who were able to write in complex sentences clearly expressing related thoughts without breaking sentences into simple declarative form were the least likely in later years to develop the debilitating symptoms and, ultimately, the disease. Avid readers and individuals who remained involved in community affairs were also less likely to develop Alzheimer's than the more reclusive members of the order. Heredity, diet, and exercise were also found to be major factors in avoiding dementia or Alzheimer's.  

Dr. Snowdon, recognized as one of the world's leading experts on aging and Alzheimer's, still conducts the Nun Study at the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging at the University of Kentucky Medical Center, where he is also Professor of Neurology. The heartwarming stories of the School Sisters are combined with easily digestible statistics from the study. The prescription for living a fulfilling and worthwhile life makes AGING WITH GRACE a book that is a beacon of hope for families who are dealing with a loved one with the disease. More than that, it may help us alter our own lifestyles and those of our children so that old age need not be an inevitable slide into ill health and mental confusion, but instead, years of productivity in which intellectual and spiritual vigor and good health are retained.

   --- Reviewed by Roz Shea (HOST BKPG ROZ)

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