As German poet Rainer
Maria Rilke once wrote in reference to his own ef forts to cheer up a young
writer:
 
Do not believe that he who seeks to comfort you now lives untroubled
among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good. His life has
much dif ficulty and sadness and remains far behind yours. Were it
otherwise he would never have been able to find those words. As I began trying to teach my patients in the first ECaP  group, I was
amazed by the results. People whose conditions had been stable or
deteriorating for a long time suddenly began to get well before my eyes. At
first this made me very uncomfortable. I felt they were getting well for
illegitimate reasons. Their progress had no obvious relation to drugs,
radiation, or other traditional treatments. I felt like a charlatan or swindler
and actually suggested disbanding the group. At that point my patients had to explain to me what was going on. “We’re getting better ,” they told me, “because you’ve given us hope and put
us in control of our lives. You don’ t understand because you’re a doctor . Sit
and be patient.” I did, and they became my teachers. Then and there we adopted as our motto a sentence from the Simontons’
book: “In the face of uncertainty , there is nothing wrong with hope.” Some
doctors have advised patients to stay away from me, so as not to build up
“false hope.” I say that in dealing with illness there is no such thing in a
patient’ s mind. Hope is not statistical. It is physiological! The concepts offalse hope and detached concern need to be discarded from the medical
vocabulary . They are destructive for doctor and patient. Whenever I work with medical students or other physicians, I ask them
for a definition of false hope. They always hem and haw , and fail to come
up with one. I make it clear to them that for most physicians “giving false
hope” simply means telling a patient that he or she doesn’ t have to behave
like a statistic. If nine out of ten people with a certain disease are expected
to die of it, supposedly you’re spreading “false hope” unless you tell all ten
they’ll probably die. Instead, I say each person could be the one who
survives, because all hope is real in a patient’ s mind. Shlomo Breznitz, a psychologist at Hebrew University in Jerusalem,
recently demonstrated that positive and negative expectation have opposite
effects on blood levels of cortisol and prolactin, two hormones important in
activating the immune system. Breznitz had several groups of Israeli
soldiers make a grueling forced march of forty kilometers, but varied the
information he gave them. He told some they would march sixty kilometers,
but stopped them at forty , and told others they would march thirty
kilometers, then said they had another ten to go. Some were allowed to see
distance markers, and some had no clues as to how far they had walked or
what the total distance would be. Breznitz found that those with the most
accurate information weathered the march best, but the stress hormone
levels always reflected the soldiers’  estimates  rather than the actual
distance. Even if what you most hope for—a complete cure—doesn’ t come to
pass, the hope itself can sustain you to accomplish many things in the
meantime. Refusal to hope is nothing more than a decision to die. I know
there are people alive today because I gave them hope and told them they
didn’ t have to die. As I began to learn from my exceptional patients, I proceeded to make
drastic changes in the way I practiced medicine. I was finally able to decide
wholeheartedly to remain a sur geon, so as to have direct, long-term
relationships with patients, but I broadened my role from that of a mere
mechanic to include some of the functions of a preacher , teacher , and
healer . I accepted patients as individuals with choices and options. We
became a team. A year before I began ECaP , I had shaved my head. Many associates
thought it was a message of empathy with those who lose their hair duringchemotherapy , but it had nothing to do with that. I later realized that it was
a symbol of the uncovering that I was trying to make, baring my own
emotions, spirituality , and love. In fact, one nurse reminded me that shaving
the head is standard preparation for any operation on the brain. The reactions were often revealing. Many people began to talk to me in
a different way , as though I were handicapped. They shared their pain
readily . Some physicians berated me for being dif ferent—all the more
reason for keeping my new look. My motives for baring my head became clearer at a workshop with
Elisabeth Kübler -Ross. One of her techniques is to have participants make
drawings illustrating aspects of their lives. I made a picture of a mountain
with snow on top, drawn with white crayon on white paper . Below it was a
pond with a fish out of water . The key was that something was being
covered up (white on white), and the spiritual symbol (the fish) was out of
place. I realized that what I meant to uncover was my love and spirituality ,
not my scalp. I had a wonderful dream that night, seeing myself with a full
head of hair . After the workshop I told my family that I knew why I’d
shaved my head and could now let my hair grow back, but our daughter
Carolyn said, “No. It’ s easy to find you in the movies.” Thus are great
decisions made. My head remains bare, although Carolyn on occasion
accidentally sits down next to other bald men. It is from this period that I date my true career in healing, for it was
only then that I found the full meaning of the work. The meaning consists
of teaching patients how to live—teaching not from a pedestal but rather
with the knowledge that we teach what we want to learn . Physicians must
educate and at the same time learn from their patients. My endeavor to
teach has been my own salvation, and I feel I am the greatest beneficiary of
ECaP . I became, as Bobbie phrased it, a “privileged listener .” I began to hear
all sorts of things that my patients felt were too emotional or too weird to
tell other doctors. They told me about their dreams, premonitions, and self-
diagnoses, the unorthodox things they’d like to add to their therapy , the so-
called coincidences that give meaning to seemingly insignificant events,
their feelings of love or fear or anger , the moments when they want to die. A few years ago, for example, a woman named Mary came to see me
after her consultation with one of my sur gical associates. She asked, “Are
you the one who does visualizing and all that stuf f?” When I told her I was,she said, “Good. I want to tell you something. Somebody is with me all the
time. He wears a white robe and a purple sash, and he has bad teeth. He’ s
always in the room.”
I asked her , “Well, what’ s his name? What does he have to say?”
She said, “I don’ t have the nerve to talk to him.”
Mary was afraid to tell her family or her own doctor about her
companion, for fear they’d think she was crazy , but once she thought I was
a little weird, too, it was safe to tell me. Such openness is an enormous
advantage for physicians. How can we hope to help people who can’ t tell us
everything  that’ s troubling them? What a relief to this woman to find out
that her guest might be just a spontaneous version of my own guide,
Geor ge! Soon after we founded ECaP , some members of the group began to tell
me that other physicians thought the things I was doing were crazy . By
then, however , I was too happy about the members’  improvement to care. I
told them, “As long as you do well, I don’ t have to worry about my
reputation.”
One of the reasons other physicians feel leery of my methods is that
they have not become privileged listeners. Sometimes they try to verify my
work by asking a patient, “What’ s going on in your life?” The patient
replies, “Nothing.” They ask, “How are you feeling?” and the patient
answers, “Fine.” Then they wonder what I’m talking about. Because so many patients have told me their innermost thoughts, I can
now tell others, “I know the kinds of things that are going wrong in your
life.” Often I can suggest exactly what patients’  emotional troubles are,
based on the symptoms and location of their disease. Then they pour out
their true feel ings. After emer gency sur gery to remove several feet of dead
intestine, a Jungian therapist recently told me, “I’m glad you’re my sur geon. I’ve been under going teaching analysis. I couldn’ t handle all the shit that
was coming up, or digest the crap in my life.” Any connection with her
feelings might not have occurred to another physician, but it was no
coincidence to us that the intestines were the focal point of her illness. Recently after a mastectomy a woman said to me that she needed to get
something of f her chest. I was tremendously excited after my first experiences with ECaP . I
thought I was learning brand-new things that would revolutionize the
practice of medicine overnight. I wrote a few articles about thesediscoveries, but the medical journals returned them. The editors said the
subject matter was interesting but advised me to submit them to psychology
journals. But psychologists didn’ t need this information. They already
accepted the mind’ s role in disease. At about the same time I came across an
article by Wallace C. Ellerbroek, formerly a sur geon, now a psychiatrist. The original subject of the piece had been the mind’ s role in cancer , but for
seven years he couldn’ t get it published. He changed the focus to acne and
it was printed in a major journal. Next I tried presenting my experiences at medical meetings. The
response was hard-nosed skepticism, if not outright scorn. Each discussion
turned into a battle of wits, a game of “my statistics against yours.” Almost
no one was willing to admit, “W ell, maybe there’ s something there. I’ll try
it.” As a result, even though there is now plenty of scientific data to ar gue
for psychotherapy in treatment of cancer and other diseases, I became
convinced that statistics rarely alter deeply held beliefs. Numbers can be
manipulated to make bias seem like logic. Rather than dwell on statistics, I
now concentrate on individual experiences. To change the mind one must
often speak to the heart…and listen. Beliefs are a matter of faith not logic. Support is now coming my way and thinking is beginning to change. Studies are being done at Yale and elsewhere. As the politics of medicine
change, funding for study changes, and new questions are explored. OceanofPDF .com2
Medicine is not only a science, but also the art of letting our own
individuality interact with the individuality of the patient . —A LBER T SCHWEITZER
OceanofPDF .comThe Healing Partnership
Mr. Wright, a client of psychologist Bruno Klopfer in 1957, had far -
advanced lymphosarcoma. All known treatments had become inef fective. Tumors the size of oranges littered his neck, armpits, groin, chest, and
abdomen. His spleen and liver were enormously enlar ged. The thoracic
lymph duct was swollen closed, and one to two quarts of milky liquid had
to be drained from his chest each day . He had to have oxygen to breathe,
and his only medicine now was a sedative to help him on his way . Despite his state, Mr . Wright still had hope. He’d heard of a new drug
called Krebiozen, which was to be evaluated at the clinic where he lay . He
didn’ t qualify for the program, because the experimenters wanted subjects
with a life expectancy of at least three and preferably six months. Wright
begged so hard, however , that Klopfer decided to give him one injection on
Friday , thinking he would be dead by Monday and the Krebiozen could be
given to someone else. Klopfer was in for a surprise:
 
I had left him febrile, gasping for air , completely bedridden. Now , here
he was, walking around the ward, chatting happily with the nurses, and
spreading his message of good cheer to any who would listen. Immediately
I hastened to see the others…. No change, or change for the worse was
noted. Only in Mr . Wright was there brilliant improvement. The tumor
masses had melted like snowballs on a hot stove, and in only these few
days, they were half their original size! This is, of course, far more rapid
regression than most radio-sensitive tumors could display under heavy X-
ray given every day . And we already knew his tumors were no longer
sensitive to irradiation. Also, he had had no other treatment outside of the
single useless “shot.”
This phenomenon demanded an explanation, but not only that, it almost
insisted that we open our minds to learn, rather than try to explain. So, the
injections were given three times weekly as planned, much to the joy of the
patient…. Within 10 days he was able to be dischar ged from his
“deathbed,” practically all signs of his disease having vanished in this short
time. Incredible as it sounds, this “terminal” patient gasping his last breath
through an oxygen mask was now not only breathing normally , and fullyactive, he took of f in his own plane and flew at 12,000 feet with no
discomfort. …[W]ithin two months, conflicting reports began to appear in the news,
all of the testing clinics reporting no results…. This disturbed Mr . Wright
considerably…. [H]e was…logical and scientific in his thinking, and he
began to lose faith in his last hope…. [A]fter two months of practically
perfect health, he relapsed to his original state and became very gloomy and
miserable. But Klopfer saw an opportunity to explore what was really going on—
to find out, as he put it, how quacks achieve some of their well-documented
cures. (Remember all healing is scientific.) He told Wright that Krebiozen
really was as promising as it had seemed, but that the early shipments had
deteriorated rapidly in the bottles. He told of a new superrefined, double-
strength product due to arrive tomorrow . The news came as a great revelation to him, and Mr . Wright, ill as he
was, became his optimistic self again, eager to start over . By delaying a
couple of days before the “shipment” arrived, his anticipation of salvation
had reached a tremendous pitch. When I announced that the new series of
injections were about to begin, he was almost ecstatic and his faith was very
strong. With much fanfare, and putting on quite an act…I administered the first
injection of the doubly potent, fresh preparation—consisting of fresh water
and nothing more. The results of this experiment were quite unbelievable to
us at the time, although we must have had some suspicion of the remotely
possible outcome to have even attempted it at all. Recovery from the second near -terminal state was even more dramatic
than the first. Tumor masses melted, chest fluid vanished, he became
ambulatory , and even went back to flying again. At this time he was
certainly the picture of health. The water injections were continued, since
they worked such wonders. He then remained symptom-free for over two
months. At this time the final AMA  announcement appeared in the press
—“Nationwide tests show Krebiozen to be a worthless drug in treatment of
cancer .”Within a few days of this report Mr . Wright was readmitted to the
hospital in extremis; his faith was now gone, his last hope vanished, and he
succumbed in less than two days. One of the best ways to make something happen is to predict it. Pooh-
poohed for some twenty years by the medical establishment, the placebo
effect—the fact that about one-fourth to one-third of patients will show
improvement if they merely believe  they are taking an ef fective medicine
even if the pill they are taking has no active ingredient—has now been
accepted as genuine by most of the profession. Dr. Howard Brody of Michigan State asserts that a positive placebo
response occurs when three factors are optimally present: the meaning of
the illness experience for the patient is altered in a positive manner; the
patient is supported by a caring group; and the patient’ s sense of mastery
and control over the illness is enhanced. Nearly all so-called primitive
medicine uses the placebo factor via rituals that foster assurance in the
healing force, whether it is defined as an external god or an internal ener gy. Faith healing relies on the patient’ s belief in a higher power and the healer ’s
ability to act as a channel to it. Sometimes a mere artifact or saint’ s relic is
conduit enough. For a believer a bottle labeled Lourdes Holy Water has
healing properties even if there’ s only tap water in it. Thus Christian
Scientists sometimes succeed in healing themselves because they’re taught
to seek peace of mind and give themselves up to a higher power . This is
why it’ s so important that a physician have a good reputation as a
“mechanic” and the ability to project confidence. A patient’ s hope and trust
lead to a “letting go” that counteracts stress and is often the key to getting
well. Unfortunately , peace often does not come until death is near . That is
when people can let go. I see many patients close to death who are still
worried about the electric bill and children staying out too late. If I tell
them, “Let go of all that and have a nice day—it may be your last day on
earth,” the next morning I find them feeling better and eating a big
breakfast. When I ask what happened, they say , “I took your advice.”
HOPE THROUGH TRUST“Primitive” medicine is actually much more sophisticated than ours in
the use of the mind, perhaps because it has fewer drugs that are ef fective
without help from the placebo ef fect. Robert Müller , Assistant Secretary-
General of the United Nations and author of Most of All They T aught Me
Happiness , has written of an African delegate who had been told by a New
York doctor that he had cancer and would die within a year . The delegate
told Müller and his other friends that he was going home to die but would
ask his relatives to notify them of the funeral so they could attend. Eighteen
months went by . Having no word, Müller , presuming the delegate dead,
called his home village to learn the details. He was pleasantly surprised to
hear the man himself, sounding quite robust. Soon after his return home, the delegate explained, the local witch
doctor had come to him and said, “Y ou look depressed.” When he learned
why, he told the sick man to come to his hut the next day . The witch doctor began therapy with a simple symbolic gesture. From a
large cauldron he dipped a small cup of liquid and said, “This cup
represents the part of your brain you are using. The cauldron the rest. I will
teach you to use the rest.” Today the man is alive and well. I am not ur ging that Western technological medicine be abandoned for
earlier kinds, but I am asking that we become open to the healing gift within
us. Over and over , psychologists remind us that most of us use only about
10 percent of our mind’ s capacity . Let us then, as the witch doctor taught,
use the other 90 percent. Science teaches that we must see in order to
believe, but we must also believe in order to see. We must be receptive to
possibilities that science has not yet grasped, or we will miss them. It’ s
absurd not to use treatments that work, just because we don’ t yet understand
them. Open-mindedness is the hallmark of all physicians who are truly
interested in helping their patients. For many years, Dr . William S. Sadler ,
one of the leading proponents of drug-based medicine at the turn of the
century , studied “mind cures,” as they were then called. In the introduction
to a series of articles in the Ladies’  Home Journal  in August 191 1, he wrote:
 
I used to have a popular lecture showing the follies of these “cures,” but
I observed that I never made a convert from the psychic ranks. And all this
time some of these systems went on curing patients that I hadn’ t cured and
couldn’ t cure. Sadler opened his mind, made a thorough inquiry into the subject, and came
away convinced that the power of suggestion, while not a panacea, was a
worthy ally of pharmacy , surgery, and hygiene. The placebo ef fect depends on a patient’ s trust in the physician. I’ve
become convinced that this relationship is more important, in the long run,
than any medicine or procedure. Psychiatrist Jerome Frank of Johns
Hopkins University found evidence for this belief in a 1969 study by R. C.
Mason, G. Clark, R. B. Reeves, and B. Wagner of ninety-eight patients who
had sur gery for detached retinas. The subjects’  independence, optimism,
and faith in their doctors before the operations were assessed. The patients
with a high level of trust healed faster than the others. To create a relationship of trust the doctor and patient must learn each
other ’s beliefs. A doctor ’s confidence in a certain treatment can be negated
by a patient’ s unspoken rejection of it. This is why I study patients’
drawings and dreams to learn unacknowledged feelings about therapy . Otherwise, I may choose what I think is a wonderful treatment, yet
encounter every conceivable side ef fect, so therapy must be stopped. The
patient may not have wanted this therapy from the first but didn’ t have the
courage to tell me, or may be rejecting it at an unconscious level. However ,
if I have a drawing showing that the patient perceives the treatment as a
poison or injurious, we can proceed from that point. We can try to modify
the patient’ s attitude toward the treatment or choose a dif ferent form of
therapy . A positive drawing done by a fearful patient may also help allay
fears and allow therapy to commence. The belief systems of physicians and patients interact, but patients’
bodies respond directly to their own beliefs, not their doctors’. Physicians
tend to be more logical, statistical, and rigid, and less inclined to have hope,
than their patients. When physicians run out of remedies, they’re likely to
give up. They must realize, however , that lack of faith in the patient’ s
ability to heal can severely limit that ability . We should never say , “There’ s
nothing more I can do for you.” There’ s always something more we can do,
even if it’ s only to sit down, talk, and help the patient hope and pray . The usual attitude of doctors is summed up perfectly in the experience
of Stephanie, one of our ECaP  patients. After the diagnosis of cancer , her
doctor outlined the rest of her life, as predicted by statistics, right into an
early grave. She asked what she could do, and he told her , “All you’ve gotis a hope and a prayer .” She asked, “How do I hope and pray?” He replied,
“I don’ t know . It’s not my line.” Her ECaP  experience taught her how to
hope and pray , and Stephanie has altered the course of her disease,
exceeding expectations, and her doctor is now making notes about her
success. Later she wrote that this doctor , in mentioning hope and prayer ,
“was actually prescribing the one medication that was going to cure me,
and he never even knew it .”
The reverse ef fect can even kill. Frances, a woman in her eighties, came
to me when she lost faith in her former physician because of his negative
attitude. Despondent because of repeated nagging illnesses, she reached out
to him for reassurance, and he asked her , “Well, how long do you want to
live, anyway?” She was smart enough to see what this outlook was doing to
her, and she left. I remember one man who wasn’ t so lucky . Ellen, an ECaP  group
member , once called her husband, Ray , who was hospitalized with cancer ,
to see how he felt. He said, “Fine.” Fifteen minutes later she arrived for a
visit, and he was dead. In the interim, Ray , who’d been in and out of the
hospital several times, had asked his doctor when he’d be able to leave. After the reply , “Oh, I don’ t think you’ll make it this time,” he died within
minutes. The physician’ s habitual prognosis of how much time a patient has left
is a terrible mistake. It’ s a self-fulfilling prophecy . It must be resisted even
though many patients keep asking, “How long? How long?” They want
someone else to define the limits of life instead of taking part in that
determination themselves. People who like their doctors and who are
passive often die right on schedule, as though to prove them right. Physicians must stop letting statistics determine their beliefs. Statistics
are important when one is choosing the best therapy for a certain illness, but
once that choice is made, they no longer apply to the individual. All patients
must be accorded the conviction that they can get well, no matter what the
odds. Exceptional patients have the ability to throw statistics aside—to say , “I
can be a survivor”—even when the doctor isn’ t wise enough to do so. Just
think of the courage it took for someone to conquer a certain type of cancer
that no one had ever conquered before. Hope instilled that kind of courage
in William Calderon, who achieved the first documented recovery from
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). * Calderon was diagnosedin December 1982. His doctors told him he would probably be dead in six
months. Understandably , he became depressed and hopeless. Almost
immediately Kaposi’ s sarcoma, the type of cancer that most often
accompanies AIDS, appeared and began spreading rapidly on all areas of
his skin and throughout his gastrointestinal tract. Soon Judith Skutch, co-founder with astronaut Edgar Mitchell of the
Institute of Noetic Sciences and now President of the Foundation for Inner
Peace, arrived at Calderon’ s hair -styling salon for her regular appointment. Noticing by his eyes that he had been weeping, she got him to tell her the
reason. Her next words turned out to be the key to saving his life. She said,
“William, you don’ t have to die. You can get well.”
Skutch described the Simontons’  work with cancer patients. With
unwavering love and support from her and from his lover , Calderon came to
believe in his own survival. By continuing at the job he loved, he refused to
give in to the disease. Instead he began meditating and using mental
imagery to combat it. He worked to restore strained relationships with his
family and achieved peace of mind by for giving people he felt had hurt him. He loved his body with exercise, good nutrition, and vitamin supplements. And from that point on his immune system showed increased response and
his tumors began to shrink. Two years after the diagnosis, Calderon showed
no signs of AIDS. The exceptional patient often gets angry at a doctor ’s heavy-handed
pronouncement of doom. Linda, a nurse I know who refused chemotherapy ,
was told by her M.D., “Y ou’ll be sorry . You’ll come crawling back here in
six months.” She kept thinking, “That S.O.B.! I won’ t die, just to prove he’ s
wrong.” She lived for over five years without his therapy , and then decided
to use it to live even longer . I have a copy of a letter from a young woman named Louise to a “rock
’n’ roll doctor ,” who had a radio show combining music with medical
advice and with whom she became close friends while she was in the
hospital. As a teenager Louise developed cancer of the ovary with
metastases to the lungs and abdomen. Her oncologist “gave” her six to
twelve months to live with chemotherapy . She told him only God could
decide when her number was up, and began to take her life into her own
hands. She left home because of stressful living conditions there, got her
own apartment, and spent her last ten dollars to place a newspaper ad,
looking for other cancer patients who needed her help. At one point heroncologist had refused her any further treatment because she was “too far
gone,” but six months after she had taken the path of her own choosing, all
her tumors had disappeared. Her doctor couldn’ t even tell her this out loud. Instead, with tears in his eyes, he handed her a prescription form on which
he’d written, “Y our cancer has disappeared.” On the day she was sup posed
to be dead, Louise sent him a joking note asking, “Where should I send the
casket?”
The “rock ’n’  roll doctor” wrote to tell me that, if he hadn’ t happened to
hear me speak about exceptional patients, he probably wouldn’ t have made
the connection between Louise’ s “miraculous” recovery and her spiritual
growth. Instead, it made sense to him, and they both came to one of our
ECaP  meetings to share the experience. Louise chose to love and give, making the kind of spiritual and
psychological changes that people who experience self-induced healings
always make. It takes enormous strength to do this when the voice of
authority is telling you you’re supposed to die. The problem is, exceptional
patients are a minority . If eight out of ten patients are not survivors, it’ s easy
to ignore the two who potentially are. I’m trying to publicize such cases so that more doctors look for them
among their own patients. Then they will see that healing is not a
coincidence. When so defined, as in the phrase “spontaneous remission,” it
teaches doctors nothing and stimulates no inquiry into the causes behind it. On the contrary , healing is a creative act, calling for all the hard work and
dedication needed for other forms of creativity . I often get letters from doctors about patients I’ve referred. When a
doctor reports amazing improvements in a patient’ s condition, he or she
almost never mentions that person’ s beliefs and lifestyle, but when I
inquire, I find the patient always  has made some drastic change toward a
more loving and accepting outlook. The patient seldom tells an unreceptive
doctor about this, however . Unexpected healing happens often enough that physicians must learn to
project hope at all times, even in what seem to be the final hours. Patients
are not looking for the results of a medical Gallup poll. They’re looking for
a success-oriented relationship. They’re looking for someone to say , “Hold
on, you can make it. We’ll help you”—as long as the patient wants to stay
alive. It is not for us to evaluate the worth of continued life for anotherperson. As long as my patients are living in a way that has value to them ,
I’m there to help them continue. However , if a patient has decided it’ s time to die, I see no contradiction
in aiding with that, too. I can help resolve conflicts that drain ener gy,
knowing that this resolution may initiate healing after all. Thus, although
telling people they will die by such and such a day is destructive and has no
place in medical practice, acceptance of death need not take away hope. Paradoxically , preparation for death can promote the cause of life. One
cancer patient, for example, was looking awful one Friday , and told me she
wanted to die. I said, “T ell your children and your parents how you feel, and
then it’ s okay . They don’ t realize how bad you feel.” On Monday when I
returned to the hospital, she looked great; she was wearing her wig, a suit,
and makeup. I said “What happened?” She said, “I told my parents how I
felt and my kids how I felt, and then I felt so good I didn’ t want to die.”
And she was dischar ged from the hospital. Despite the need for optimism, no part of the diagnosis should ever be
hidden. The truth can always be delivered with hope, since no one can be
certain of the future. Moreover , I can now accept illness and see my primary
task as helping patients achieve peace of mind. This puts the physical
problems in perspective. Getting well is not the only goal. Even more
important is learning to live without fear , to be at peace with life, and
ultimately death. Then healing can occur and one is no longer set up for
failure (by believing one can cure all physical problems and never die). Twenty years ago “benign deception” was common. Since then,
attitudes have under gone a complete about-face. A 1979 survey by Dr . Dennis Novack and his co-workers, published in the Journal of the
American Medical Association , found that 97 percent of doctors preferred
to tell cancer patients their diagnosis, as compared with 90 percent who said
they would not in a survey two decades earlier . Fortunately , clinicians have realized that patients usually know the truth
anyway . On an unconscious and even on a conscious level, patients know
what is going on in their bodies. Bill, a physician patient of mine, had
difficulty swallowing at dinner one night. He said he knew he had cancer ,
because his father had cancer of the esophagus and stomach at the same
age. One symptom and he knew . Of course, everyone reassured him, but
tests proved him right.Lies and evasions drive families apart just when they most need to be
united in facing the crisis honestly . Families often say , “Don’ t tell mama. She can’ t handle it.” When I ask mama what she thinks is wrong, she says,
“I guess it’ s cancer .” The word is out then, and we can talk about what
cancer means to the family—a challenge or a death sentence. Deceit also
drives out confidence. When the physician hesitates, cannot pronounce the
word “cancer ,” or puts on a false front, the patient’ s mind immediately
translates: “The doctor can’ t handle this. There is no hope.”
Too many doctors today have gone from benign deception to a brutal
honesty that also does more harm than good. I recently received a
heartrending letter from a patient’ s wife, explaining that her husband would
not be keeping his second appointment with me because he had committed
suicide. It was two days after he was told—with the most careless brutality—
that he would never play tennis, captain a boat, or go to work again, all—
particularly the first two—things he loved. All along, he had had the most innocent faith in his doctors, not that
they could ef fect a cure, but that they were doing their best. They ,
particularly his oncologist, had no best. Far better to admit that the situation is grave, yet to remind the patient
in truth that there is no “incurable” disease from which someone has not
recovered, even at the threshold of death. When a doctor can instill some measure of hope, the healing process
sometimes starts even before treatment begins. I recall one of my patients
whose radiologist told her that the drugs were working, because her bone
scan had improved dramatically . She replied, “If you’ll look at my
schedule, you’ll see I haven’ t started chemotherapy yet. It must be that
shiny-headed doctor .”
Dr. Alexandra Levine, a California oncologist, recently received a grant
to study psychosocial aspects of cancer . She applied for it because of a
similar experience. A man with extensive lymphoma was brought to her
office. The patient’ s wife insisted he visit her before traveling all the way to
Germany for a “miracle” cure he wanted to try . When Dr . Levine saw the
panic in the man’ s eyes, she spent an hour simply calming and reassuringhim. When he came back the next week, his tumors had shrunk by about
half. She said, “I wish I had started your treatment last week.” He told her ,
“You did.”
Hope comes about lar gely as a result of the patient’ s confidence and
trust in the healer . This bond is for ged in many ways. Certain essentials—
compassion, acceptance, availability , a willingness to provide information
—are obvious. That is why preoperative visits by the sur gical team are so
important. They not only help the patient through the sur gery but also speed
recovery . In a study described in Dr . Herbert Benson’ s The Mind/Body
Effect , a group led by Dr . Lawrence Egbert at Harvard showed that patients
who received a visit from the anesthesiologist the night before sur gery, as
well as other explanations and reassurances not given to a group of control
patients, needed only half as much pain medication. They also left the
hospital more than two and a half days sooner , on the average, than the
control group. A sense of humor is an enormous asset, too. Many times when I’m in a
room with a “dying” patient we are laughing. Out in the hallway , the other
staff members often think we are denying reality . We’re simply still alive
and thus able to laugh. Hospital personnel must realize that people aren’ t
“living” or “dying.” They are either alive or dead. As long as they are alive,
we must treat them that way . I find the word “terminal” terribly upsetting. It
means we’ve begun to treat that person as though he or she were already
dead. Studies have shown that it takes doctors and nurses longer to respond
to the call button from a “terminal” patient’ s room than a button pressed by
someone who is not labeled that way . The word implies a state of mind
more than a physical condition, and it turns of f the staf f’s empathy and
ability to give the full measure of care needed. It also confronts them with
their own mortality . It’s also essential that patients know they can express anger to their
physician without hurting the relationship. I’ve often heard people complain
about their doctors, only to be asked not to mention it to them for fear of
retribution in the future. Unexpressed anger hurts the patient and must be
shared to establish a healing team. How poor the bond must be for a patient
to believe that a doctor would not respond to criticism on a professional
level. I’m happy when patients express anger at me, because it means they
feel safe with me, that we have a good relationship and they are behaving
like survivors.My father had sur gery several years ago and was sent home with what I
thought were very poor instructions. As a result, he suf fered complications. I wrote to each physician, the sur geon and the internist, expressing my
feelings. From the sur geon I got a letter blaming me for the problems. The
internist wrote back saying, “Thank you. Every now and then we need a
letter like that to help us do our best.” I advised my father , “Change
surgeons and keep your internist.”
UNCONSCIOUS AWARENESS
Because of its ef fect on the patient, a doctor ’s attitude is often crucial to
the success of treatment. One of the most important factors is a patient’ s
confidence in having the doctor ’s undivided attention. I remember being in
an operating room as an intern years ago with a patient under spinal
anesthesia. Hearing only sports talk among the staf f, he asked plaintively ,
“Won’t someone please say something about me and my operation?”
Picture the absurdity of a person with severe cancer having to listen to a
technician worry about missing a hockey game or a doctor complain about
being late to have her hair done. Only empathy can build the connection
needed for healing. When a doctor sits down for one minute at the bedside
to talk, the patient experiences it as five or ten minutes. If the doctor stands
in the doorway , the same visit seems like fifteen seconds. Attitude counts even when the patient is unconscious, asleep, in coma,
or under anesthesia. Milton Erickson, the great psychiatrist and
hypnotherapist, showed in the early 1950s that voices known and
meaningful to the patient were heard and understood during anesthesia. A
Baltimore obstetrician once told me he had noticed a subtle change in his
patients’  behavior many years ago when the switch was made from ether to
lighter anesthetics. To investigate, he brought a court stenographer into the
operating room to record every word spoken during several caesarean
sections. He found that under hypnosis these patients could repeat the
conversations word for word. Recent work has confirmed this unconscious awareness. Henry Bennett,
a psychologist at the University of California Medical School at Davis,
played a tape to anesthetized patients asking them to signal that they had
heard the message by touching their ears during a post-op interview . Nearly
all of them repeatedly tugged at their ears without being aware of it, butnone could remember the message. In another experiment, Dr . Bennett
asked unconscious patients to make one hand warmer than the other , and
they promptly complied. With another group of patients, nonhypnotic pre-
op suggestions that blood would leave the hip area reduced blood loss by
half during hip sur gery. We have incredible mechanisms by which we can
direct chemotherapy to a cancer or divert blood and starve a tumor . For years I’ve been utilizing the ability of unconscious patients to hear . I talk to persons in coma to let them know their medical status. In one case I
told a woman who had been in coma for three years, with no signs of
recovery , that her family was giving her permission to go, and that by dying
she would not be a failure as a mother . I said they would miss her , but it
was all right to let go if she wanted to. In fifteen minutes she died. When I
enter a room where a patient is sleeping, I simply announce myself softly
and let his unconscious awareness awaken him if he wants to talk to me at
that moment. If he doesn’ t wake up and there’ s no ur gent problem, I return
later. Several sur geons have now begun using the anesthetized mind’ s powers
to help prevent complications. After lower back sur gery, many people have
trouble urinating and often need catheters because of spasms in the pelvic
muscles. One group of researchers suggested to patients on the operating
table that they would be able to relax the crucial muscles afterward. None
of these patients needed catheters. In the operating room I’m constantly communicating with patients
about what is happening, and I’ve found that this can make the dif ference
between life and death. Talking reassuringly to patients who are having
cardiac irregularities during sur gery can reverse the irregularities or slow a
rapid pulse. Recently I was operating on a very husky young man, built like
a football player . His size led to some minor technical problems, and while
solving them I looked up at the monitor and saw that his pulse was 130. I
knew that he had been anxious about the operation, so I said to him,
“Victor, I’m having some mechanical dif ficulties because you’re a big guy ,
but there’ s no problem with the sur gery. This part is just a little dif ficult to
do. You’re doing well. Don’ t be nervous. I’d like your pulse to be 83.”
During the next few minutes, without any other medication, his pulse came
right down to 83 and remained there. Many anesthesiologists who’ve heard
of such episodes have begun speaking to their anesthetized patients, givingthem calming messages. Fear filled messages can increase the incidence of
cardiac arrest. Once, as I finished a dif ficult emer gency abdominal operation on a
young, very obese man, his heart stopped just as we were about to move
him to the recovery room. He didn’ t respond to resuscitation. The
anesthesiologist had given up and was walking out the door when I spoke
out loud into the room, “Harry , it’s not your time. Come on back.” At once
the cardiogram began to show electrical activity , and the man ultimately
recovered fully . I can’ t prove it, of course, but I am sure the verbal message
made the dif ference. I know the experience made believers out of the other
staff members who were present, and there is certainly no reason not to
communicate with a patient in every possible way . It’s especially important to avoid negative messages, because the
anesthetized patient’ s conscious defense mechanisms aren’ t functioning. Recently a medical student named Tim wrote me a letter describing one
surgeon’ s operating-room manner:
I heard the sur geon talking with a vengeance in his voice that I thought
was reserved solely for medical students. “This lady ,” he proclaimed, “tells
me she’ s holistic! Hoooolistic, ha! She’ s so holistic that the highlight of her
life was probably buying a bird-watching book!” Soon after , I heard, “She’ s
so holistic that she thinks that radiation will hurt her . Why , she’ s uglier than
the secretary on the Beverly Hillbillies.” On and on it went, insult after
insult, as if she was a thousand miles away and not under general anesthesia
three feet from where he spoke. “She says she’ s hypoglycemic. Ha! She’ s a
strange  woman.”
Then he announced, “Look at this. This is cancer . It’s full of cancer , it’s
malignant,” and he pulled out a chunk of tissue as though he were cutting a
piece of his favorite apple pie. Needless to say , she awoke from anesthesia cold, crying, and in lots of
pain. Tim befriended the woman through further tests and a radical
mastectomy , playing one of my ECaP  tapes for her . His love helped her take
more control over her treatment, which in turn reduced her pain. She
refused radiation and chemotherapy , which she feared as poisonous, in
favor of the holistic alternatives she believed in. In his letter , Tim noted that
it’s too early to know the outcome of her illness, but he met her soon afterher dischar ge from the hospital and found her vibrant, ener getic, and
glowing with love. She also cleared up a mystery that had been puzzling Tim for several
days. The same sur geon who had been so abusive had performed her
mastectomy , but that time he was caring and gentle. Tim wrote:
 
Why did he visit her in the recovery room and call her at home? Why
was he the only member of the hospital staf f to support her decision to
refuse further testing, telling her to “go home, rest, and get healthy”? It seems that on the morning of sur gery as he made his fifteen-second
preoperative visits, she caught him of f guard with a hug like he’d never
experienced before (at least not from any of his patients). At first he was
taken aback, not knowing how to respond. Later he hugged her back, and
they both strongly embraced. Sometimes it’ s not clear who is the patient and who is the physician. I
don’t know if either of them has cured their cancers, but they have helped
each other . I always make sure that operating-room personnel don’ t say anything
they wouldn’ t say if the patient were awake. When a sur geon makes a quip
like, “If he ever leaves here, it’ll be feet first,” it’ s no wonder the patient
wakes up crying in the recovery room. One can be honest about the
diagnosis and still implant positive thoughts about the future treatment. A
simple statement like “Y ou’ll wake up comfortable, thirsty , and hungry”—
modified for obese patients—will promote recovery . Even the desire to
smoke can be reduced by a suggestion at the end of the operation. I also do
not hesitate to ask the patient not to bleed if circumstances call for it. It’ s
well known that yogis and hypnotized subjects can control bleeding, and
the verbal request also seems to work during anesthesia. I sometimes
wonder if anesthesia suggestions might sometimes be utilized as a form of
psychotherapy . The ambience of the clinical environment influences the attitude of both
doctor and patient. I fear that we lost one of our most important sources of
strength—a connection to God and nature—when hospital planners took the
windows out. A view of the outside world reminds us of our link to all life,
helping us survive. Recent research at a hospital in Pennsylvania showedthat patients whose rooms faced an open courtyard, a tree, and the sky got
well faster than those whose rooms faced a brick wall. In Mortal Lessons
Dick Selzer has written eloquently of the same ef fect from the physician’ s
viewpoint:
 
Not long ago, operating rooms had windows. It was a boon and a
blessing in spite of the occasional fly that managed to strain through the
screens and threaten our very sterility . For the adventurous insect drawn to
such a ravishing spectacle, a quick swat and, Presto! The door to the next
world sprang open. But for us who battled on, there was the benediction of
the sky , the applause and reproach of thunder . A Divine consultation
crackled in on the lightning! And at night, in Emer gency , there was the
pomp, the longevity of the stars to deflate a sur geon’ s ego. It did no patient
a disservice to have Heaven looking over his doctor ’s shoulder . I very much
fear that, having bricked up our windows, we have lost more than the
breeze; we have severed a celestial connection. To work in windowless rooms is to live in a jungle where you cannot
see the sky . Because there is no sky to see, there is no grand vision of God. Instead, there are the numberless fragmented spirits that lurk behind leaves,
beneath streams. The one is no better than the other , no worse. Still, a man
is entitled to the temple of his preference. Mine lies out on a prairie,
wondering up at Heaven. Or in a many windowed operating room where,
just outside the panes of glass, cows graze, and the stars shine down upon
my carpentry . To reestablish this celestial connection I use music, whose healing
properties have been known since biblical times. During the age of the
prophets, harp players would perform special pieces of music to provoke a
mental state in which extrasensory powers were thought to be activated, as
is said of Elisha—“And it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the
hand of the Lord came upon him.” David played for King Saul to help him
recover from his depression and paranoia. Music opens a spiritual window . When I first brought a tape recorder
into the O.R., it was considered an explosion hazard. But we ran it onbatteries, and then the nurses and anesthesiologists felt so much better that,
if I for got my music, they’d ask for it. Now there are tape recorders in
almost all the operating rooms in New Haven. A recent study at the Pacific Medical Center of Presbyterian Hospital in
San Francisco showed that music eased anxiety , stress, and pain in children
and adults during the traumatic procedure of cardiac catheterization. Young
children responded best to nursery rhymes, Peter and the W olf, or Sesame
Street songs. Older children and teenagers were calmer with rock music,
while adults had other favorites. However , biokinesiologists have found that loud rock music can be
weakening, and I do not suggest it for the operating room. Music should
serve to calm both the patient and the staf f, helping them deal with stress. In
the operating room, it should focus everyone’ s attention on the fact that
there is a living person being operated on. It should help the staf f relate to
that person as though he were awake, rather than distracting them from the
surgery. I find that spiritual music and the baroque lar go movements
recommended in Superlearning , by Sheila Ostrander and L ynn Schroeder ,
are most ef fective for these purposes. I encourage patients to use tapes of
whatever music they find most relaxing or healing, in order to adapt the
hospital environment to a healing environment. I also refer you to The
Healing Ener gies of Music , by Hal Lingerman, for specific needs. Daniel
Kobialka’ s versions of classical pieces are excellent too. I’ve learned what kinds of music are appropriate, and I vary the type
according to the sur gical situation. I often tease the students by telling them
I have specific music to stop bleeding. Sometimes the patient’ s response
leads to an unexpected note of humor . I enjoy spiritual music, and one
afternoon, while I was working on a man under spinal anesthesia, the tape
came to “Amazing Grace.” The patient’ s head popped up, and he asked, “Is
anything wrong down there?” We all laughed and said no. He said, “W ell,
I’m Irish, and if you’ll sing ‘When Irish Eyes are Smiling,’  I’ll feel better .”
We did, and he enjoyed the performance. One patient, listening to harp
music just before the operation began, said, “It’ s a good thing I heard that
while I’m awake. If I woke up and heard it, I wouldn’ t know where I was.”
Another day a patient under local anesthesia started laughing and said,
“Most appropriate,” while I was removing a lar ge benign tumor . In the
background Frank Sinatra was singing “Why Not Take All of Me.”DUAL  CONTROL
Participation in the decision-making process, more than any other
factor , determines the quality of the doctor -patient relationship. The
exceptional patient wants to share responsibility for life and treatment, and
doctors who encourage that attitude can help all their patients heal faster . The value of participation has been borne out in two re cent studies of
children. At the University of Wisconsin Medical School Dr . Charlene
Kavanagh compared a group of severely burned children who received
standard nursing care with another group who were taught to change their
own dressings. Those who had an active role needed less medication and
had fewer complications. In Palo Alto, California, a group of asthmatic
children were taught about their disease and the drugs used to control it, and
encouraged to decide for themselves when they needed medication. They
missed far fewer school days and their average rate of emer gency-room
visits dropped from one a month to one every six months. Furthermore, shared responsibility increases cooperation and reduces
the resentments that often lead to malpractice suits. Second-guessing and
recrimination are unlikely when decisions are based on a mutual assessment
of what is right for the patient now , not on predictions about the
unknowable future. I don’ t want any of my patients going under anesthesia
without feeling that I am doing for them what they wanted done. (However ,
when certain patients seem likely to be angry at themselves if something
goes wrong in the future, based upon their decision, I may suggest they give
me more control. I would rather have them mad at me than at themselves. I’ve done my best, so I can handle their anger .) Sometimes, when people are subconsciously not sure they want to live,
they shy away from the most ef fective treatment or have so many side
effects that it must be stopped. Even when they desperately want to live,
they may still disagree with the doctor , who must then fight the impulse to
withdraw or coerce. A physician who tries to guarantee the future often
pressures the patient into a particular course of treatment, setting them both
up for recriminations and feelings of failure if the disease is not cured. On the other hand, when a patient chooses a form of therapy out of
conviction, while accepting the fact that death is inevitable someday , that
patient will never be a failure and never regret the decision. The physician
must remember that it’ s the patient who must make the choice and then live
with it .It’s the physician’ s duty to accept all patients—though not necessarily to
support all their choices. A physician has a right to say , “I can’ t agree with
what you’re doing and don’ t want to participate in it.” The sad part is that
that kills a lot of people, because they then never go back to a physician. I
generally tell such patients, “I don’ t agree with what you’re doing, or if I
had your illness I wouldn’ t choose your plan of treatment, because I don’ t
think you have the best chance of being successful with it, but I will
continue to keep a relationship with you, if you wish, and help in any way I
can.”
Then, if they find that their choice is not productive, they will say , “I
know you care about me, because you’ve kept up the relationship. Will you
go ahead and operate on me?” There’ s no other way a doctor can maximize
hope while leaving open a way for the patient later to adopt the treatment
recommended by the doctor . Up to this point one hundred percent of my
patients have accepted chemotherapy , radiation, or sur gery when I have
accepted them, even those who initially attempted self-healing and rejected
the medical profession. Even those whose initial of fice visit began with
“never talk to me like a doctor! If you do I won’ t come back.”
Acceptance by the physician can help a patient achieve healing and
peace, as shown in the case of Bridget, an English woman who had recently
moved to New Jersey . Under the English medical system, she’d been
assigned a physician, and she didn’ t like him so she never went back. She
had a tumor the size of a melon taking the place of her left breast. I
examined her and listed the things I thought could help her , from sur gery to
God. She said, “Y ou’re the first doctor who hasn’ t screamed and yelled at
me, and said, ‘Where have you been? Why didn’ t you come sooner? Why
have you been so stupid? What is wrong with you?’” I told her that’ s not
my role. My job is simply to accept patients and try to help them. I had Bridget draw pictures, which showed unconscious positive
attitudes toward radiation and chemotherapy , although consciously she
resisted both at first. Several months later she called to tell me that she had
started chemotherapy and the tumor had melted away . Her response was so
dramatic that her oncologist didn’ t even think she would need radiation. My
acceptance of Bridget’ s condition had enabled her to accept what the
medical profession had to of fer. Some sur geons insist on running the whole show , how ever. They even
prohibit their patients from using Reach to Recovery (a post-op emotionaland physical therapy program) after mastectomy . They have no right to do
so, but some physicians try to take char ge of a patient’ s life as well as the
technical details of treatment, like a grownup dominating a child—and the
sad truth is that many patients let them. Physicians are created as much by
their patients as by their training, and most patients want to give up all
decisions to the omnipotent father figure. The exceptional patient fights for
responsibility but is punished for this act of survival because he represents a
minority of the patients seen by the doctor . As Kostoglotov , the former
concentration camp inmate in Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’ s Cancer W ard,
complained to his physician:
 
No sooner does a patient come to you than you begin to do all his
thinking for him. After that, the thinking’ s done by your standing orders,
your five-minute conferences, your program, your plan and the honor of
your medical department. And once again I become a grain of sand, just as I
was in the camp. Once again nothing depends  on me. Critics of modern medicine like to point out the numerous times the
death rate has plummeted during doctors’  strikes—1976 in Los Angeles, the
same year in Bogotá, and 1973 in Jerusalem, for example. They usually say
something simplistic, like “Medical care is hazardous to your health.” More
likely , patients suddenly realize that they have to start looking out for
themselves, make their own decisions, as they should have been doing all
along, and that is what keeps them alive longer . Several years ago there was
a strike of ambulance drivers on Cape Cod, where we have a summer
house. Panic ensued—what to do with emer gencies? Well, the number of
emer gencies dropped precipitously until the strike was over—another
wonderful example of how much control we have. THE MECHANIC AND THE HEALER
The all too common failure to interact fruitfully with patients comes
from the way a physician is taught to be a mere mechanic. In medical
school we learn all about disease, but we learn nothing about what disease
means  to the person who has it.In a study of folk medicine in Taiwan and among Chinese-Americans,
Dr. Arthur Kleinman, of the University of Washington School of Medicine,
attributed the folk doctor ’s often surprising success to treatment of sickness
in the context of the patient’ s psychology and culture. The strong stigma
attached to mental illness in Chinese society means that a Chinese person
often can only conceive of depression, for example, in terms of its physical
symptoms, such as fatigue. Hence any treatment that does not allow the
patient to believe in a physical cause of the problem is likely to be resisted
and remain inef fective. Kleinman points out a dif ference between disease , defined as the
physical or psychiatric symptoms or damage visible to a doctor , and illness ,
the patient’ s subjective experience of the same sickness. The two are often
remarkably dif ferent, especially when a person without scientific
knowledge is treated by a Western physician. I don’ t recommend going into trances or burning spirit money (unless
the patient believes only in such methods), but we must, like Plato’ s free
physicians, ask patients what they think caused the problem, what threats
and losses (or gains) it represents to them , and how they believe it should be
treated. The typical review of systems that medical students are trained to
use when questioning patients does not uncover time sequences or the
meanings that events have to patients. Even questions like “What did your
father die of?” are rarely pursued to find out whether the patient’ s father
died last week or twenty years ago. Therefore, doctors often have no idea of
the dynamics of the situation, unless patients volunteer those aspects, which
they often don’ t do. The best results proceed from a “negotiation” in which the practitioner ’s
viewpoint and that of the patient come close enough together for true
communication. If a person fervently believes in religious healing through
the laying on of hands, the clinician must not become an obstacle and
detract from that treatment’ s effectiveness. Even if the physician thinks
such methods are useless, they are likely to help if the patient believes in
them. I often tell patients how I would treat myself if I had their illness. My
choices may not include some of the things they’re doing. Likewise, their
choices may not include some of the things I would do. But I do not take
away the benefit of their methods by saying they’re no good. Instead I work
to see how our beliefs can mesh. To me the true measure of wholisticmedicine is how well the patient and doctor accept each other ’s belief
system, even though their beliefs may dif fer. Neither one of us forces
something upon the other . That way I can say , “If sometimes your beliefs
don’t work, try mine.”
I recently talked to Vivian, a Christian Scientist who said she had been
attempting—in vain—to cure herself of a severe bladder infection through
prayer . Finally she couldn’ t stand the pain anymore, so she went to the
emer gency room. She said a young, inexperienced doctor gave her
medication that completely cleared up her symptoms within twenty-four
hours. The episode changed her , making her feel that medicines also come
from God and should be used along with our inner healing skills. Obviously , I will try to talk patients out of spending enormous amounts
of time and money on something I feel is inef fective, but where positive
beliefs are involved I will try to support them. Doing what restores hope is
beneficial. Studies show that spending money and traveling a long distance
actually help a patient get well. There’ s a strong ur ge to be able to say , “I
got my money’ s worth.” Moreover , the ef fort shows a high level of
motivation. Such a patient will invariably listen to the physician’ s advice
and act on it. I used to tell patients to mail drawings and call me until I
realized the importance of their desire to come. A gentleman from Montana,
with cancer of the pancreas, came to me with a 3-month prognosis for
survival. He was alive 18 months later because of his hope. Similarly , a
willingness to give a little will help the patient accept the doctor ’s beliefs,
allowing the medical therapy a real chance to work. When patients have no
faith in the physician’ s system, they will resist treatment consciously , by not
taking their medicine, or unconsciously . In either case, healing will be
thwarted. The value of identifying with the patient explains why the best doctors
are often those who’ve been seriously ill themselves. Throughout our
training we learn not to empathize with the sick, supposedly to save us
psychic strain. All our terminology emphasizes the separation. Instead of a
“heart attack,” the hospital page operator says “Code 5.” The emotional
distance hurts both parties, however . We withdraw just when patients need
us most. Nurses know how hard it is to find the doctor when a patient is
dying. All our education encourages us to think of ourselves as gods of
repair , miracle workers. When we can’ t fix what’ s broken, we crawl of f to
lick our wounds, feeling like failures.The distance also encourages doctors to feel invulnerable: “It’ s always
other people who are sick, not me.” When I tell a roomful of medical
students, “Almost everybody dies,” they all laugh; but when I say the same
line to a roomful of doctors, there’ s dead silence. We become the best
deniers of all. As Dr . Gordon Deckert, chief of psychiatry at the University
of Oklahoma Medical Center , has observed, “Physicians usually know
exactly what they think and believe, but rarely are they in touch with how
they feel.”
A panel set up by the Association of American Medical Colleges
recently concluded that technological specialization is driving out the
“exquisite regard for human needs” essential to a doctor ’s prime goal, the
relief of suf fering. The main task facing medical schools, said panel
chairman Dr . Steven Muller , is to find ways of fostering that regard, which
must be taught lar gely by example. Instead, the unspoken ideal instilled in college is a medical machismo—
the superhumanly tough doc who can handle anything without letting it
show . It’s okay to be scared of an exam, but admitting a fear of illness and
death becomes a sign of weakness. Naturally , after graduation, we M.D.s deny our sadness at a patient’ s
misfortune, our anger at a patient’ s resistance, even our joy at a patient’ s
recovery . We are generally very conscientious about our work, but are often
unable to relax, play , and recuperate. As a result, we overlook all sorts of
warning signals about our own health.
_OceanofPDF.com_Love_Medicine_n_Miracles_-_Bernie_Siegel.txt
Summarize the following text section accurately and concisely. Maintain specific details and numerical information, and use anti-repetition mechanisms:

        As German poet Rainer
Maria Rilke once wrote in reference to his own ef forts to cheer up a young
writer:
 
Do not believe that he who seeks to comfort you now lives untroubled
among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good. His life has
much dif ficulty and sadness and remains far behind yours. Were it
otherwise he would never have been able to find those words. As I began trying to teach my patients in the first ECaP  group, I was
amazed by the results. People whose conditions had been stable or
deteriorating for a long time suddenly began to get well before my eyes. At
first this made me very uncomfortable. I felt they were getting well for
illegitimate reasons. Their progress had no obvious relation to drugs,
radiation, or other traditional treatments. I felt like a charlatan or swindler
and actually suggested disbanding the group. At that point my patients had to explain to me what was going on. “We’re getting better,” they told me, “because you’ve given us hope and put
us in control of our lives. You don’ t understand because you’re a doctor. Sit
and be patient. ” I did, and they became my teachers. Then and there we adopted as our motto a sentence from the Simontons’
book: “In the face of uncertainty, there is nothing wrong with hope. ” Some
doctors have advised patients to stay away from me, so as not to build up
“false hope. ” I say that in dealing with illness there is no such thing in a
patient’ s mind. Hope is not statistical. It is physiological. The concepts offalse hope and detached concern need to be discarded from the medical
vocabulary. They are destructive for doctor and patient. Whenever I work with medical students or other physicians, I ask them
for a definition of false hope. They always hem and haw, and fail to come
up with one. I make it clear to them that for most physicians “giving false
hope” simply means telling a patient that he or she doesn’ t have to behave
like a statistic. If nine out of ten people with a certain disease are expected
to die of it, supposedly you’re spreading “false hope” unless you tell all ten
they’ll probably die. Instead, I say each person could be the one who
survives, because all hope is real in a patient’ s mind. Shlomo Breznitz, a psychologist at Hebrew University in Jerusalem,
recently demonstrated that positive and negative expectation have opposite
effects on blood levels of cortisol and prolactin, two hormones important in
activating the immune system. Breznitz had several groups of Israeli
soldiers make a grueling forced march of forty kilometers, but varied the
information he gave them. He told some they would march sixty kilometers,
but stopped them at forty, and told others they would march thirty
kilometers, then said they had another ten to go. Some were allowed to see
distance markers, and some had no clues as to how far they had walked or
what the total distance would be. Breznitz found that those with the most
accurate information weathered the march best, but the stress hormone
levels always reflected the soldiers’  estimates  rather than the actual
distance. Even if what you most hope for—a complete cure—doesn’ t come to
pass, the hope itself can sustain you to accomplish many things in the
meantime. Refusal to hope is nothing more than a decision to die. I know
there are people alive today because I gave them hope and told them they
didn’ t have to die. As I began to learn from my exceptional patients, I proceeded to make
drastic changes in the way I practiced medicine. I was finally able to decide
wholeheartedly to remain a sur geon, so as to have direct, long-term
relationships with patients, but I broadened my role from that of a mere
mechanic to include some of the functions of a preacher, teacher, and
healer. I accepted patients as individuals with choices and options. We
became a team. A year before I began ECaP, I had shaved my head. Many associates
thought it was a message of empathy with those who lose their hair duringchemotherapy, but it had nothing to do with that. I later realized that it was
a symbol of the uncovering that I was trying to make, baring my own
emotions, spirituality, and love. In fact, one nurse reminded me that shaving
the head is standard preparation for any operation on the brain. The reactions were often revealing. Many people began to talk to me in
a different way, as though I were handicapped. They shared their pain
readily. Some physicians berated me for being dif ferent—all the more
reason for keeping my new look. My motives for baring my head became clearer at a workshop with
Elisabeth Kübler -Ross. One of her techniques is to have participants make
drawings illustrating aspects of their lives. I made a picture of a mountain
with snow on top, drawn with white crayon on white paper. Below it was a
pond with a fish out of water. The key was that something was being
covered up (white on white), and the spiritual symbol (the fish) was out of
place. I realized that what I meant to uncover was my love and spirituality,
not my scalp. I had a wonderful dream that night, seeing myself with a full
head of hair. After the workshop I told my family that I knew why I’d
shaved my head and could now let my hair grow back, but our daughter
Carolyn said, “No. It’ s easy to find you in the movies. ” Thus are great
decisions made. My head remains bare, although Carolyn on occasion
accidentally sits down next to other bald men. It is from this period that I date my true career in healing, for it was
only then that I found the full meaning of the work. The meaning consists
of teaching patients how to live—teaching not from a pedestal but rather
with the knowledge that we teach what we want to learn. Physicians must
educate and at the same time learn from their patients. My endeavor to
teach has been my own salvation, and I feel I am the greatest beneficiary of
ECaP. I became, as Bobbie phrased it, a “privileged listener. ” I began to hear
all sorts of things that my patients felt were too emotional or too weird to
tell other doctors. They told me about their dreams, premonitions, and self-
diagnoses, the unorthodox things they’d like to add to their therapy, the so-
called coincidences that give meaning to seemingly insignificant events,
their feelings of love or fear or anger, the moments when they want to die. A few years ago, for example, a woman named Mary came to see me
after her consultation with one of my sur gical associates. She asked, “Are
you the one who does visualizing and all that stuf f. ” When I told her I was,she said, “Good. I want to tell you something. Somebody is with me all the
time. He wears a white robe and a purple sash, and he has bad teeth. He’ s
always in the room. ”
I asked her, “Well, what’ s his name. What does he have to say. ”
She said, “I don’ t have the nerve to talk to him. ”
Mary was afraid to tell her family or her own doctor about her
companion, for fear they’d think she was crazy, but once she thought I was
a little weird, too, it was safe to tell me. Such openness is an enormous
advantage for physicians. How can we hope to help people who can’ t tell us
everything  that’ s troubling them. What a relief to this woman to find out
that her guest might be just a spontaneous version of my own guide,
Geor ge. Soon after we founded ECaP, some members of the group began to tell
me that other physicians thought the things I was doing were crazy. By
then, however, I was too happy about the members’  improvement to care. I
told them, “As long as you do well, I don’ t have to worry about my
reputation. ”
One of the reasons other physicians feel leery of my methods is that
they have not become privileged listeners. Sometimes they try to verify my
work by asking a patient, “What’ s going on in your life. ” The patient
replies, “Nothing. ” They ask, “How are you feeling. ” and the patient
answers, “Fine. ” Then they wonder what I’m talking about. Because so many patients have told me their innermost thoughts, I can
now tell others, “I know the kinds of things that are going wrong in your
life. ” Often I can suggest exactly what patients’  emotional troubles are,
based on the symptoms and location of their disease. Then they pour out
their true feel ings. After emer gency sur gery to remove several feet of dead
intestine, a Jungian therapist recently told me, “I’m glad you’re my sur geon. I’ve been under going teaching analysis. I couldn’ t handle all the shit that
was coming up, or digest the crap in my life. ” Any connection with her
feelings might not have occurred to another physician, but it was no
coincidence to us that the intestines were the focal point of her illness. Recently after a mastectomy a woman said to me that she needed to get
something of f her chest. I was tremendously excited after my first experiences with ECaP. I
thought I was learning brand-new things that would revolutionize the
practice of medicine overnight. I wrote a few articles about thesediscoveries, but the medical journals returned them. The editors said the
subject matter was interesting but advised me to submit them to psychology
journals. But psychologists didn’ t need this information. They already
accepted the mind’ s role in disease. At about the same time I came across an
article by Wallace C. Ellerbroek, formerly a sur geon, now a psychiatrist. The original subject of the piece had been the mind’ s role in cancer, but for
seven years he couldn’ t get it published. He changed the focus to acne and
it was printed in a major journal. Next I tried presenting my experiences at medical meetings. The
response was hard-nosed skepticism, if not outright scorn. Each discussion
turned into a battle of wits, a game of “my statistics against yours. ” Almost
no one was willing to admit, “W ell, maybe there’ s something there. I’ll try
it. ” As a result, even though there is now plenty of scientific data to ar gue
for psychotherapy in treatment of cancer and other diseases, I became
convinced that statistics rarely alter deeply held beliefs. Numbers can be
manipulated to make bias seem like logic. Rather than dwell on statistics, I
now concentrate on individual experiences. To change the mind one must
often speak to the heart…and listen. Beliefs are a matter of faith not logic. Support is now coming my way and thinking is beginning to change. Studies are being done at Yale and elsewhere. As the politics of medicine
change, funding for study changes, and new questions are explored. OceanofPDF. com2
Medicine is not only a science, but also the art of letting our own
individuality interact with the individuality of the patient. —A LBER T SCHWEITZER
OceanofPDF. comThe Healing Partnership
Mr. Wright, a client of psychologist Bruno Klopfer in 1957, had far -
advanced lymphosarcoma. All known treatments had become inef fective. Tumors the size of oranges littered his neck, armpits, groin, chest, and
abdomen. His spleen and liver were enormously enlar ged. The thoracic
lymph duct was swollen closed, and one to two quarts of milky liquid had
to be drained from his chest each day. He had to have oxygen to breathe,
and his only medicine now was a sedative to help him on his way. Despite his state, Mr. Wright still had hope. He’d heard of a new drug
called Krebiozen, which was to be evaluated at the clinic where he lay. He
didn’ t qualify for the program, because the experimenters wanted subjects
with a life expectancy of at least three and preferably six months. Wright
begged so hard, however, that Klopfer decided to give him one injection on
Friday, thinking he would be dead by Monday and the Krebiozen could be
given to someone else. Klopfer was in for a surprise:
 
I had left him febrile, gasping for air, completely bedridden. Now, here
he was, walking around the ward, chatting happily with the nurses, and
spreading his message of good cheer to any who would listen. Immediately
I hastened to see the others…. No change, or change for the worse was
noted. Only in Mr. Wright was there brilliant improvement. The tumor
masses had melted like snowballs on a hot stove, and in only these few
days, they were half their original size. This is, of course, far more rapid
regression than most radio-sensitive tumors could display under heavy X-
ray given every day. And we already knew his tumors were no longer
sensitive to irradiation. Also, he had had no other treatment outside of the
single useless “shot. ”
This phenomenon demanded an explanation, but not only that, it almost
insisted that we open our minds to learn, rather than try to explain. So, the
injections were given three times weekly as planned, much to the joy of the
patient…. Within 10 days he was able to be dischar ged from his
“deathbed,” practically all signs of his disease having vanished in this short
time. Incredible as it sounds, this “terminal” patient gasping his last breath
through an oxygen mask was now not only breathing normally, and fullyactive, he took of f in his own plane and flew at 12,000 feet with no
discomfort. …[W]ithin two months, conflicting reports began to appear in the news,
all of the testing clinics reporting no results…. This disturbed Mr. Wright
considerably…. [H]e was…logical and scientific in his thinking, and he
began to lose faith in his last hope…. [A]fter two months of practically
perfect health, he relapsed to his original state and became very gloomy and
miserable. But Klopfer saw an opportunity to explore what was really going on—
to find out, as he put it, how quacks achieve some of their well-documented
cures. (Remember all healing is scientific. ) He told Wright that Krebiozen
really was as promising as it had seemed, but that the early shipments had
deteriorated rapidly in the bottles. He told of a new superrefined, double-
strength product due to arrive tomorrow. The news came as a great revelation to him, and Mr. Wright, ill as he
was, became his optimistic self again, eager to start over. By delaying a
couple of days before the “shipment” arrived, his anticipation of salvation
had reached a tremendous pitch. When I announced that the new series of
injections were about to begin, he was almost ecstatic and his faith was very
strong. With much fanfare, and putting on quite an act…I administered the first
injection of the doubly potent, fresh preparation—consisting of fresh water
and nothing more. The results of this experiment were quite unbelievable to
us at the time, although we must have had some suspicion of the remotely
possible outcome to have even attempted it at all. Recovery from the second near -terminal state was even more dramatic
than the first. Tumor masses melted, chest fluid vanished, he became
ambulatory, and even went back to flying again. At this time he was
certainly the picture of health. The water injections were continued, since
they worked such wonders. He then remained symptom-free for over two
months. At this time the final AMA  announcement appeared in the press
—“Nationwide tests show Krebiozen to be a worthless drug in treatment of
cancer. ”Within a few days of this report Mr. Wright was readmitted to the
hospital in extremis; his faith was now gone, his last hope vanished, and he
succumbed in less than two days. One of the best ways to make something happen is to predict it. Pooh-
poohed for some twenty years by the medical establishment, the placebo
effect—the fact that about one-fourth to one-third of patients will show
improvement if they merely believe  they are taking an ef fective medicine
even if the pill they are taking has no active ingredient—has now been
accepted as genuine by most of the profession. Dr. Howard Brody of Michigan State asserts that a positive placebo
response occurs when three factors are optimally present: the meaning of
the illness experience for the patient is altered in a positive manner; the
patient is supported by a caring group; and the patient’ s sense of mastery
and control over the illness is enhanced. Nearly all so-called primitive
medicine uses the placebo factor via rituals that foster assurance in the
healing force, whether it is defined as an external god or an internal ener gy. Faith healing relies on the patient’ s belief in a higher power and the healer ’s
ability to act as a channel to it. Sometimes a mere artifact or saint’ s relic is
conduit enough. For a believer a bottle labeled Lourdes Holy Water has
healing properties even if there’ s only tap water in it. Thus Christian
Scientists sometimes succeed in healing themselves because they’re taught
to seek peace of mind and give themselves up to a higher power. This is
why it’ s so important that a physician have a good reputation as a
“mechanic” and the ability to project confidence. A patient’ s hope and trust
lead to a “letting go” that counteracts stress and is often the key to getting
well. Unfortunately, peace often does not come until death is near. That is
when people can let go. I see many patients close to death who are still
worried about the electric bill and children staying out too late. If I tell
them, “Let go of all that and have a nice day—it may be your last day on
earth,” the next morning I find them feeling better and eating a big
breakfast. When I ask what happened, they say, “I took your advice. ”
HOPE THROUGH TRUST“Primitive” medicine is actually much more sophisticated than ours in
the use of the mind, perhaps because it has fewer drugs that are ef fective
without help from the placebo ef fect. Robert Müller, Assistant Secretary-
General of the United Nations and author of Most of All They T aught Me
Happiness, has written of an African delegate who had been told by a New
York doctor that he had cancer and would die within a year. The delegate
told Müller and his other friends that he was going home to die but would
ask his relatives to notify them of the funeral so they could attend. Eighteen
months went by. Having no word, Müller, presuming the delegate dead,
called his home village to learn the details. He was pleasantly surprised to
hear the man himself, sounding quite robust. Soon after his return home, the delegate explained, the local witch
doctor had come to him and said, “Y ou look depressed. ” When he learned
why, he told the sick man to come to his hut the next day. The witch doctor began therapy with a simple symbolic gesture. From a
large cauldron he dipped a small cup of liquid and said, “This cup
represents the part of your brain you are using. The cauldron the rest. I will
teach you to use the rest. ” Today the man is alive and well. I am not ur ging that Western technological medicine be abandoned for
earlier kinds, but I am asking that we become open to the healing gift within
us. Over and over, psychologists remind us that most of us use only about
10 percent of our mind’ s capacity. Let us then, as the witch doctor taught,
use the other 90 percent. Science teaches that we must see in order to
believe, but we must also believe in order to see. We must be receptive to
possibilities that science has not yet grasped, or we will miss them. It’ s
absurd not to use treatments that work, just because we don’ t yet understand
them. Open-mindedness is the hallmark of all physicians who are truly
interested in helping their patients. For many years, Dr. William S. Sadler,
one of the leading proponents of drug-based medicine at the turn of the
century, studied “mind cures,” as they were then called. In the introduction
to a series of articles in the Ladies’  Home Journal  in August 191 1, he wrote:
 
I used to have a popular lecture showing the follies of these “cures,” but
I observed that I never made a convert from the psychic ranks. And all this
time some of these systems went on curing patients that I hadn’ t cured and
couldn’ t cure. Sadler opened his mind, made a thorough inquiry into the subject, and came
away convinced that the power of suggestion, while not a panacea, was a
worthy ally of pharmacy, surgery, and hygiene. The placebo ef fect depends on a patient’ s trust in the physician. I’ve
become convinced that this relationship is more important, in the long run,
than any medicine or procedure. Psychiatrist Jerome Frank of Johns
Hopkins University found evidence for this belief in a 1969 study by R. C. Mason, G. Clark, R. B. Reeves, and B. Wagner of ninety-eight patients who
had sur gery for detached retinas. The subjects’  independence, optimism,
and faith in their doctors before the operations were assessed. The patients
with a high level of trust healed faster than the others. To create a relationship of trust the doctor and patient must learn each
other ’s beliefs. A doctor ’s confidence in a certain treatment can be negated
by a patient’ s unspoken rejection of it. This is why I study patients’
drawings and dreams to learn unacknowledged feelings about therapy. Otherwise, I may choose what I think is a wonderful treatment, yet
encounter every conceivable side ef fect, so therapy must be stopped. The
patient may not have wanted this therapy from the first but didn’ t have the
courage to tell me, or may be rejecting it at an unconscious level. However,
if I have a drawing showing that the patient perceives the treatment as a
poison or injurious, we can proceed from that point. We can try to modify
the patient’ s attitude toward the treatment or choose a dif ferent form of
therapy. A positive drawing done by a fearful patient may also help allay
fears and allow therapy to commence. The belief systems of physicians and patients interact, but patients’
bodies respond directly to their own beliefs, not their doctors’. Physicians
tend to be more logical, statistical, and rigid, and less inclined to have hope,
than their patients. When physicians run out of remedies, they’re likely to
give up. They must realize, however, that lack of faith in the patient’ s
ability to heal can severely limit that ability. We should never say, “There’ s
nothing more I can do for you. ” There’ s always something more we can do,
even if it’ s only to sit down, talk, and help the patient hope and pray. The usual attitude of doctors is summed up perfectly in the experience
of Stephanie, one of our ECaP  patients. After the diagnosis of cancer, her
doctor outlined the rest of her life, as predicted by statistics, right into an
early grave. She asked what she could do, and he told her, “All you’ve gotis a hope and a prayer. ” She asked, “How do I hope and pray. ” He replied,
“I don’ t know. It’s not my line. ” Her ECaP  experience taught her how to
hope and pray, and Stephanie has altered the course of her disease,
exceeding expectations, and her doctor is now making notes about her
success. Later she wrote that this doctor, in mentioning hope and prayer,
“was actually prescribing the one medication that was going to cure me,
and he never even knew it. ”
The reverse ef fect can even kill. Frances, a woman in her eighties, came
to me when she lost faith in her former physician because of his negative
attitude. Despondent because of repeated nagging illnesses, she reached out
to him for reassurance, and he asked her, “Well, how long do you want to
live, anyway. ” She was smart enough to see what this outlook was doing to
her, and she left. I remember one man who wasn’ t so lucky. Ellen, an ECaP  group
member, once called her husband, Ray, who was hospitalized with cancer,
to see how he felt. He said, “Fine. ” Fifteen minutes later she arrived for a
visit, and he was dead. In the interim, Ray, who’d been in and out of the
hospital several times, had asked his doctor when he’d be able to leave. After the reply, “Oh, I don’ t think you’ll make it this time,” he died within
minutes. The physician’ s habitual prognosis of how much time a patient has left
is a terrible mistake. It’ s a self-fulfilling prophecy. It must be resisted even
though many patients keep asking, “How long. How long. ” They want
someone else to define the limits of life instead of taking part in that
determination themselves. People who like their doctors and who are
passive often die right on schedule, as though to prove them right. Physicians must stop letting statistics determine their beliefs. Statistics
are important when one is choosing the best therapy for a certain illness, but
once that choice is made, they no longer apply to the individual. All patients
must be accorded the conviction that they can get well, no matter what the
odds. Exceptional patients have the ability to throw statistics aside—to say, “I
can be a survivor”—even when the doctor isn’ t wise enough to do so. Just
think of the courage it took for someone to conquer a certain type of cancer
that no one had ever conquered before. Hope instilled that kind of courage
in William Calderon, who achieved the first documented recovery from
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). * Calderon was diagnosedin December 1982. His doctors told him he would probably be dead in six
months. Understandably, he became depressed and hopeless. Almost
immediately Kaposi’ s sarcoma, the type of cancer that most often
accompanies AIDS, appeared and began spreading rapidly on all areas of
his skin and throughout his gastrointestinal tract. Soon Judith Skutch, co-founder with astronaut Edgar Mitchell of the
Institute of Noetic Sciences and now President of the Foundation for Inner
Peace, arrived at Calderon’ s hair -styling salon for her regular appointment. Noticing by his eyes that he had been weeping, she got him to tell her the
reason. Her next words turned out to be the key to saving his life. She said,
“William, you don’ t have to die. You can get well. ”
Skutch described the Simontons’  work with cancer patients. With
unwavering love and support from her and from his lover, Calderon came to
believe in his own survival. By continuing at the job he loved, he refused to
give in to the disease. Instead he began meditating and using mental
imagery to combat it. He worked to restore strained relationships with his
family and achieved peace of mind by for giving people he felt had hurt him. He loved his body with exercise, good nutrition, and vitamin supplements. And from that point on his immune system showed increased response and
his tumors began to shrink. Two years after the diagnosis, Calderon showed
no signs of AIDS. The exceptional patient often gets angry at a doctor ’s heavy-handed
pronouncement of doom. Linda, a nurse I know who refused chemotherapy,
was told by her M. D. , “Y ou’ll be sorry. You’ll come crawling back here in
six months. ” She kept thinking, “That S. O.
Rainer Maria Rilke
Who is the German poet mentioned in the passage?
He advises them to realize that giving patients hope is not the same as spreading false hope, and that it's essential to consider the patient's perspective and emotions.
What is the author's advice to medical students when it comes to "false hope"?
"In the face of uncertainty, there is nothing wrong with hope."
What did Dr. Simonton's book say, which the author adopted as the motto for ECaP?
He accepted her and reassured her, which helped her to accept her condition and eventually recover.
What did Dr. Levine do to help a patient with a severe bladder infection?
The author believes that a doctor's attitude, including their ability to instill hope and trust, plays a crucial role in the healing process and that it's essential to prioritize the patient's emotional and psychological well-being.
What is the author's perspective on the importance of a doctor's attitude in the healing process?