Summary of Jonathan Reisman's The Unseen Body

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

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#1 The human throat is an example of a body part that is poorly designed. It is where food and drink separate into their respective tubes, the esophagus and windpipe, but they can also slip together, causing choking, suffocation, and death.

#2 The root of Suzanne’s problem lay in the mechanics of her swallowing. She was aspirating food while eating, which led to her coughing. The five separate cranial nerves and more than twenty different muscles that are involved in swallowing are designed to compensate for the throat’s inherently dangerous anatomy.

#3 The back of the human throat is home to the number one pneumonia-causing strain of bacteria. In Alzheimer’s patients and those suffering from other neurodegenerative diseases, this infection is extremely common.

#4 Aspirations are a inevitable part of life, and everyone will aspirate at some point. Coughing is the body’s attempt to cope with aspiration’s inevitability. For healthy people, it works quite well, but Suzanne could not muster the strength.

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Rafbók: 2 april 2022