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"Poliomyelitis Patients United States Biography."
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To play again : a memoir of musical survival
\"At age twenty-one, while she was working with the legendary Nadia Boulanger in France, concert pianist Carol Rosenberger was stricken with paralytic polio--a condition that knocked out the very muscles she needed in order to play. But Rosenberger refused to give up. Over the next ten years, against all medical advice, she struggled to rebuild her technique and regain her life as a musician--and went on to not only play again, but to receive critical acclaim for her performances and recordings\"--Amazon.com.
Book
Seven Wheelchairs
In 1959, seventeen-year-old Gary Presley was standing in line, wearing his favorite cowboy boots and waiting for his final inoculation of Salk vaccine. Seven days later, a bad headache caused him to skip basketball practice, tell his dad that he was too ill to feed the calves, and walk from barn to bed with shaky, dizzying steps. He never walked again. By the next day, burning with the fever of polio, he was fastened into the claustrophobic cocoon of the iron lung that would be his home for the next three months. Set among the hardscrabble world of the Missouri Ozarks, sizzling with sarcasm and acerbic wit, his memoir tells the story of his journey from the iron lung to life in a wheelchair.Presley is no wheelchair hero, no inspiring figure preaching patience and gratitude. An army brat turned farm kid, newly arrived in a conservative rural community, he was immobilized before he could take the next step toward adulthood. Prevented, literally, from taking that next step, he became cranky and crabby, anxious and alienated, a rolling responsibility crippled not just by polio but by anger and depression, \"a crip all over, starting with the brain.\" Slowly, however, despite the limitations of navigating in a world before the Americans with Disabilities Act, he builds an independent life.Now, almost fifty years later, having worn out wheelchair after wheelchair, survived post-polio syndrome, and married the woman of his dreams, Gary has redefined himself as Gimp, more ready to act out than to speak up, ironic, perceptive, still cranky and intolerant but more accepting, more able to find joy in his family and his newfound religion. Despite the fact that he detests pity, can spot condescension from miles away, and refuses to play the role of noble victim, he writes in a way that elicits sympathy and understanding and laughter. By giving his readers the unromantic truth about life in a wheelchair, he escapes stereotypes about people with disabilities and moves toward a place where every individual is irreplaceable.
eBook
Becoming FDR : the personal crisis that made a president
\"In popular memory, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the quintessential political \"natural.\" Born in 1882 to a wealthy, influential family and blessed with charisma, he seemed destined for high office from birth. Yet for all his gifts, the young Roosevelt nonetheless lacked depth, empathy, and strategic ability. Those qualities, so essential to his success as president, were skills he acquired during his eight-year struggle through illness and recovery. Becoming FDR traces the riveting story of the crucible that forged Roosevelt's political ascent. Soon after contracting polio in 1921, the former vice-presidential candidate was left paralyzed from the waist down at the age of thirty-nine. He spent nearly a decade trying to heal and rehabilitate his body and adapt to the stark new reality of his life. By the time he reemerged on the national stage, his character and his abilities had been transformed. He had become shrewd by necessity, tailoring his speeches to a new medium-radio-that allowed him to reach listeners far beyond his physical presence. Suffering had also taught Roosevelt compassion, cementing his bond with those he once famously called \"the forgotten man.\" Most crucially, he had discovered how to find hope in a seemingly hopeless situation-a genius for inspiration he employed to motivate Americans through the Great Depression and World War II. The polio years were transformative too for Eleanor Roosevelt, whose at-first reluctant appearances as her husband's surrogate sparked a drive to become a force in her own right. Tracing the physical, political, and personal transformation of the iconic president, Becoming FDR is the story of a man who found his strong, true self in the depths of a crushing challenge-and re-emerged with wisdom he would use to inspire the world\"-- Provided by publisher.
BOOK
Polio and its aftermath : the paralysis of culture
It was not long ago that scientists proclaimed victory over polio, the dread disease of the 1950s. More recently polio resurfaced, not conquered at all, spreading across the countries of Africa. As we once again face the specter of this disease, along with other killers like AIDS and SARS, this powerful book reminds us of the personal cost, the cultural implications, and the historical significance of one of modern humanity's deadliest biological enemies. In Polio and Its Aftermath Marc Shell, himself a victim of polio, offers an inspired analysis of the disease. Part memoir, part cultural criticism and history, part meditation on the meaning of disease, Shell's work combines the understanding of a medical researcher with the sensitivity of a literary critic. He deftly draws a detailed yet broad picture of the lived experience of a crippling disease as it makes it way into every facet of human existence.
Polio and Its Aftermath conveys the widespread panic that struck as the disease swept the world in the mid-fifties. It captures an atmosphere in which polio vied with the Cold War as the greatest cause of unrest in North America--and in which a strange and often debilitating uncertainty was one of the disease's salient but least treatable symptoms. Polio particularly afflicted the young, and Shell explores what this meant to families and communities. And he reveals why, in spite of the worldwide relief that greeted Jonas Salk's vaccine as a miracle of modern science, we have much more to fear from polio now than we know.
eBook
MoneyWatch Report
Meanwhile, stocks closed mixed yesterday led by gains in tech and industrial companies. The Dow did decline twenty-six points. The NASDAQ closed up eighteen, hitting a new record. The S&P 500 gained three points.
Transcript
The Treatment of Multiple Sclerosis in Los Angeles and the United States, 1947-1960
Two sets of multiple sclerosis (MS) patient records located in Los Angeles County from the 1940s and 1950s were analyzed within the historical perspective and biomedical context of the time. It was found that there were divergent treatment patterns, and a continuum of therapeutic activism in the treatment of MS: some physicians attempted to intervene aggressively in an attempt to prevent relapses or lessen the severity of attacks, while others adopted milder interventions, basing their therapeutic decisions on their knowledge of the pathology of MS. As long as a physician had a reasonable theory of the pathogenesis of the disease, it was thought permissible to experiment with therapies, despite equivocal evidence, as long as no harm was done. Indeed, for physicians faced with declining and suffering patients, there was a strong emotional imperative to attempt treatments without waiting for an agreed-upon proof of efficacy. This was sustained, in part, by pressure to treat from many patients who shared their physicians' willingness to experiment with treatments.
Journal Article
The uneasy balance of doctors and their machines
Medical innovations including specialized ones such as CT scans and MRIs have completely changed the character of medical care. In the 1920s, doctors only had a handful of diagnostic tools such as stethoscopes, microscopes, thermometers and sphygmomanometers. Doctors back then would take a patient's history, listened to the heart through a stethoscope and monitored the blood pressure with a sphygmomanometer. They focused more on diagnosing and treating symptoms of the disease. These innovations, according to medical historian Paul J. Edelson, would pave the way for treating the pathophysiology of a disease and not just the symptoms.
Magazine Article