At least five serious medical conditions were named for him, of which the most famous was (and remains) Addison’s disease, a degenerative disorder of the adrenal glands that Addison described in 1855, making it the first hormonal disorder to be identified. Despite his fame, Addison was subject to spells of depression, and in 1860, five years after identifying Addison’s, he retired to Brighton and killed himself. Addison’s disease is a rare but still-serious illness. It affects about one person in ten thousand. History’s most famous sufferer was John F. Kennedy, who was diagnosed with it in
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