|
|
|
|
|
|
Wake up and smell the herbs To the Editor: You admit you’re not doing anything for wet or dry macular degeneration except using the laser blunderbuss, which doesn’t do the job at all. Why doesn’t such a lofty research institution explore all potential therapies, including the use of herbs for both types of macular degeneration? I am 83 and in excellent health; five years ago I developed wet macular degeneration in my left eye. A highly regarded ophthalmologist blinded that eye with a laser. Knowing the danger to my good eye, I applied to two esteemed clinics for treatment. One refused me because my bad eye was too bad, and my good eye too good, for their FDA protocol. The other turned me down because I was taking Coumadin. So what was I to do? I wrote about my plight in a Wall Street Journal article. Immediately I received about 200 letters and calls, one from a technical journalist in California. He encouraged me to try herbs to strengthen the walls of the little capillaries and to prevent the growth of unwanted capillaries. I have now been on herbs for three years, going on four. My own ophthalmologist in New York says my good eye is just as good as ever: I read without glasses, drive anywhere day or night and use distance glasses for golf four times a week. Even though orthodox medicine frowns on much of alternative medicine, I would encourage Yale to explore herbal approaches in treating macular degeneration. It might open your eyes and help you help thousands, even millions, of other people keep their eyes open. Woodrow Wirsig Bruce Shields, Department chair responds: Although ophthalmology has made great strides in the preservation of vision with regard to many disease processes, macular degeneration remains one for which we still have very little to offer our patients. The good news, however, is that this is one of the areas in which the greatest amount of research is being concentrated. I fully agree that our efforts should leave no stone unturned. At the Yale Eye Center, we have identified macular degeneration and related retinal disorders among our primary research targets, and we have both research scientists and clinician-scientists working diligently toward this goal.
Peters was vindicated but dismayed by decision To the Editor: Sylvia Axelrod, M.D.
’50, HS ’50-52
Shame and grief over a matter of words To the Editor: There are various ways to translate, and attribution to original sources is sometimes difficult, but when I passed through the pathology department as a medical student, I thought it was Virchow who had said, “Grief that has no vent in tears makes other organs weep.” Perhaps Dr. Spiro modified Virchow’s statement to fit the direction of his address, and, perhaps with the full address before me, I would not be carping like this. The way I learned it seems somewhat more appropriate, especially given that we used to believe that stress was responsible for various gastrointestinal problems. Robert C. Wallach,
M.D. ’60 From Howard Spiro: I am grateful to Dr. Wallach for providing the source of the original quotation that I often repeat, even in my textbook. I had long ascribed it to the psychiatrist Maudsley but, on assurance that he had never said, “The sorrow that has no vent in tears makes other organs weep,” I have usually just put it in quotes. Perhaps I was overly subtle in switching “shame” for “sorrow” and “words” for “tears” but, in the context of what the Austrians were finally confessing, I thought I was making a point. I will trade a copy of my published remarks for the specific reference to Virchow. Fair enough?
|