The title of this piece is not intended to annoy or provoke a negative response from the American medical profession. Quite to the contrary. These pieces, having to do with medical conditions, are offered in the hope that they may add to the knowledge of what is known about the body. In effect, these essays deal with the effects of conditions as they relate to a patient. The researchers have had much to say, as have had the pundits in academia. The pharmaceutical industry has not been reluctant to offer its thoughts. Doctors from time to time have also contributed to the body of knowledge having to do with medical practice. What is missing here is a response by the patient. Somehow, the patient seems to have been overlooked in this debate. So these essays go to the point of trying to explain the effects of the conditions that are associated with strokes, seizures, and blindness.
I have no academic credentials that would enable me to explain the causes of these reactions. I can only relate to the effects of what has taken place in my own case. It is my hope that this information will add to the body of knowledge about these three conditions. They are written in a conversational style which I suspect some of you may welcome as a departure from the highly technical clinical studies that are offered to physicians. The longest word in these essays has to do with a medical procedure called a trabeculectomy. But that word is a commonplace among ophthalmologists.
The story should start probably in 1987 when I had a coronary artery bypass graft performed by Dr. Eric Rose at the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York. There were no aftereffects from that operation. In 1992, there was a transient ischemic attack (TIA) that left my left arm limp for about 36 hours. That started my regimen of taking cumadin at a level of around five milligrams per day.
At the end of 1997, it was determined that I needed an aortic valve replacement. The surgeon recommended that I discontinue the use of cumadin in preparation for that operation. He suggested, “Lay off for five days.” However, on the fourth or fifth day I had a stroke. Fortunately the stroke did not affect my limbs but it did leave me with a substantial case of aphasia.
In the ensuing years there were three or three and a half seizures, with the last one occurring in May of 2004. As you will note if you read these earlier essays, the effects of the stroke and of the seizures were to wipe out significant pieces from my memory.
After the stroke of 1997, I became a patient at the Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation here in northern New Jersey. As a means of exercising my brain, Shirley Morgenstein, the Director, suggested that I should write essays. Some 200 essays or more have now been written on various subjects and the collection here comes from the output of these adventures into prose.
Going down the line, there are four essays having to do with blindness. For better or for worse, my family has been afflicted with glaucoma, which resulted in blindness to my father and to my elder brother and now to me. In the first essay called “Fading to Gray,” written about 18 months before blindness finally occurred, you will note the inevitability that blindness posed in my case. The ensuing essays were called “Sing No Sad Songs for This Old Geezer,” which was intended to announce the fact that I was now blind to my friends and associates. At the six-month mark of my blindness, there was an essay called “Are You Going to Believe Me or Your Lying Eyes?” That of course is a remark by the famed comedian Groucho Marx. As I completed the first full year of blindness, I dictated the essay called “It’s Only the First Inning.”
Again, I hold no brief for explaining what causes strokes or seizures or blindness. These essays are offered simply to reflect the views of a patient. It is my hope, obviously, that they may offer in some way a contribution to the body of knowledge about these three conditions.
And so, I have answered my own question, that is the title of this piece. I have asked the patient and these six essays represent his response.
Finally, I wish to state that my medical problems have been well taken care of by caring physicians. First there was Eric Rose, whose CABG operation is now approaching the completion of its nineteenth year. That may be a record for CABG operations and I am grateful. Then there are the ophthalmologists such as Eric Gurwin of the Summit Medical Group and Jay Katz of the Wills Eye Hospital in Philadelphia. I have great respect for both of these men. Then there is Andrew Beamer, a cardiologist who is not only a fine and decent fellow but a good friend. Many others in the Summit Medical Group have kept me alive and kicking as I enter my 85th year. And at last, there is Richard Robbins, an ophthalmologist who was prosecuted for fondling seven women. He made two mistakes: he fondled a lady cop and he contended after this broke in the papers that in touching the woman’s chest he was searching for signs of future eye problems. Even I know that signs of future eye problems are found on the scalp not on the chest. I offered to testify at Robbins’ trial but was turned down by his attorney. In any case, the point is that I have great respect for the medical community and for the work it does. I suspect I would not be here if it were not for that.
E. E. CARR
July 26, 2006
Essay 205
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Kevin’s commentary: The following essays to be posted to this site will be the ones referenced in this essay. I know “Sing no sad songs for this old geezer” well; it is an Ezra’s Essays classic. I do not believe I have read “It’s Only the First Inning,” among some of the others mentioned, so I look forward to those.
I’m reminded of a quote here, by a man named Charles Bukowski. He titled his book “What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.” Pop has seen a hell of a lot, so to speak, of fire. Blindness in one’s old age, strokes, seizures, aphasia — not easy things to brush off. But he hasn’t really complained, just as his father didn’t complain.