Medicine ◆ Patients Are Our Teachers
Chunichi Shimbun, Morning Edition, November 24, 2006
“Awakenings” (1990, USA)
True advances in medicine come from carefully observing and understanding the conditions of patients. Doctors learn from their patients every day. Awakenings is a story based on a real-life “miracle summer” that took place in 1969 in a neurological ward in New York.
The hospital housed many patients left in a state of profound lethargy after encephalitis, unable to speak or move. Dr. Malcolm Sayer (Robin Williams), who had just moved from basic research into clinical medicine, discovered that the patients’ reflexes were still intact and attempted rehabilitation using a ball game. His enthusiasm inspired the staff, who had given up hope of recovery.
Sayer hypothesized that if the patients’ rigidity could be relieved, their brain functions might be restored, and he thought of using a drug for Parkinson’s disease. Leonard (Robert De Niro), who had been in this lethargic state for 30 years since the age of eleven, was selected as the first patient.
The effect was dramatic. Awakening from his long sleep, Leonard grieved over the thirty years he had lost, yet was exhilarated by being able to walk and talk again—and even fell in love. Encouraged by this success, Sayer applied to the hospital board to administer the drug to other patients. One after another, they rose from their beds and were even able to enjoy dancing.
But Leonard’s recovery was short-lived, and his emotions also became increasingly unstable. The confusion spread to the other patients, leaving Sayer troubled by the fact that he had attempted the experimental treatment.
One day, after suffering a severe seizure, Leonard, rigid once again, cries out to Sayer, “Film me. Learn from me.” In the end, the awakening of all the patients proved to be temporary. Yet Sayer, who had struggled with human relationships, discovered the joy of connecting with his patients and resolved to continue his research.
The possibility of recovery for diseases once considered difficult or incurable came not only from doctors and medical staff who refused to give up developing treatments, but above all from the cooperation and collaborative efforts of the patients themselves and their families.
