37 years (1903–1941)

Wife of Lou Gehrig. After her husband’s death, Mrs. Gehrig never remarried and lived quietly in her apartment on Manhattan’s East Side for more than forty years.

Eleanor Gehrig, the widow of Lou Gehrig, the great Yankee first baseman of half a century ago, died Tuesday night at Presbyterian Hospital. She was 79 years old, and had been ill since last August. Since her husband’s death in 1941, Mrs. Gehrig had lived quietly in her apartment on the East Side.

Eleanor Gehrigm. 1933–1941

Ruth struck out 1,330 times in his career, Gehrig, only 790 times. Gehrig hit more doubles, triples, and averaged nine home runs fewer than Ruth did, and had twice as many MVPs as the Sultan of Swat. Ruth still holds career records in slugging, OPS, and OPS+ and hit over 200 home runs more than Gehrig.

For many years following, ALS was commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. He was diagnosed with ALS on his 36th birthday during a visit with his wife Eleanor to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, on June 19, 1939.

ALS is fatal. The average life expectancy after diagnosis is two to five years, but some patients may live for years or even decades. (The famous physicist Stephen Hawking, for example, lived for more than 50 years after he was diagnosed.) There is no known cure to stop or reverse ALS.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is commonly known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease,” named after the famous New York Yankees baseball player who was forced to retire after developing the disease in 1939. The earliest symptoms of the disease depend upon which nerves and muscles are first affected.

Jean-Martin Charcot

ALS often starts in the hands, feet or limbs, and then spreads to other parts of your body. As the disease advances and nerve cells are destroyed, your muscles get weaker. This eventually affects chewing, swallowing, speaking and breathing.

The earliest signs of ALS usually include muscle weakness or stiffness (spasticity). ALS typically affects all muscles under voluntary control, and the person ultimately loses their strength and ability to eat, speak, grasp things, move and even breathe.

Although the disease can strike at any age, symptoms most commonly develop between the ages of 55 and 75. Gender. Men are slightly more likely than women to develop ALS. However, as people age the difference between men and women disappears.

Symptoms Of End Stages Of ALS Paralysis of voluntary muscles. Inability to talk, chew and drink. Difficulty breathing. Potential heart complications.

It is unlikely that the disease process of ALS actually began suddenly. The truth was that the weakness was just perceived suddenly, although the motor unit loss must have begun insidiously prior to the awareness of the weakness.

Causes and Types of ALS

• Sporadic ALS.
• Familial ALS.
• Guamanian ALS.

Most people who develop ALS are between the ages of 40 and 70, with an average age of 55 at the time of diagnosis. However, cases of the disease do occur in people in their twenties and thirties. ALS is 20 percent more common in men than in women.

Most of the time ALS is not inherited. In about 90% of cases, the person diagnosed is the only member of the family with the disease. These cases are called “sporadic ALS”. The cause of sporadic ALS is not well understood, but may be due to a combination of environmental and genetic risk factors.

This group includes diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, progressive bulbar palsy, primary lateral sclerosis, progressive muscular atrophy, spinal muscular atrophy, Kennedy’s disease, and post-polio syndrome.

As motor neurone disease progresses to its final phase, a person with the condition will probably experience:

• increasing body paralysis, which means they’ll need help with most daily activities.
• significant shortness of breath.

They are more likely to affect men than women. Inherited forms of the condition may be present at birth. They are most likely to appear after the age of 40 years. The various types may have different risk factors.