Providentia

How Dangerous is a Broken Heart?

“The broken heart. You think you will die, but you keep living, day after day after terrible day.” - Charles Dickens

According to  Center For Disease Control statistics,   suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States with an estimated 44,193 Americans killing themselves each year.   But that may well be the tip of the iceberg considering that only one in 25 suicide attempts will actually be fatal.  As well, there may be no way to tell how many deaths believed to be due to natural causes or accidents are actually suicides.   Still, while health statistics confirm that more people than ever are attempting suicide, advances in emergency medicine and new research into the psychological roots of suicide may succeed in reversing this trend.

While researchers have identified different risk factors for suicide, relationship or marital problems seem to stand out in particular.  Not only are people dealing with relationship abuse or emotional conflict at particular risk for suicide attempts, but studies also show that terminating a relationship can boost suicide risk as well.  In the same way that being in a committed relationship helps protect against stress or depression, this same sense of commitment may become dangerous once  that relationship dissolves.  Since any romantic relationship requires a significant investment of time, emotional bonding, shared friendship, and property, the sudden end of any relationship  can have serious consequences.

To read more, check out my new Psychology Today blog post.

Why You Should Have a Backup Goal

Goal setting theory has been studied and adopted in a wide variety of domains including game design. While goals can help people regulate and change behavior, they are less motivating when people no longer believe they can meet their goals. Previous literature suggests that having two goals–a primary goal and a backup goal–might help people continue striving even when the primary goal becomes unattainable. A new study in the International Journal of Human-Computer Studies evaluated this hypothesis and found no direct relationship between two goals and performance. However, people having two goals had higher self-appraisals of their performance than those with one goal. People in the two-goal condition also played more rounds or spent more time in games. However, a high percentage of people stopped playing after achieving their backup goal. These results have the potential to enhance game experiences and may extend to other domains, such as health behavior change. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved)

For the abstract

 

Psychiatric Patient Escapes Hawaii Hospital To Prove He Could Live On His Own

When Randall Saito was reported missing from Hawaii State Hospital in Honolulu on November 12, news of his escape made national news.   Having been acquitted by reason of insanity for a brutal 1979 murder, the 59-year-old Saito was declared by police to be "very dangerous" as they searched for the escapee.   Wayne Tashima, the Honolulu prosecutor who opposed Saito's attempts to leave hospital grounds unescorted publicly warned people not to approach him due to fears he would kill again.

But Saito had already left Hawaii by that time.   Though police are still investigating whether he had help, they determined that he had hailed a cab, boarded a chartered plane bound for Maui, and they took a commercial flight to San Jose, California.  By the time hospital staff noticed his absence, he was already in California.   After several days, police received a tip from a taxi driver and arrested Saito who was apparently on his way to Stockton, California where his brother lived.    While he remains in a Stockton jail, he Hawaii Attorney General’s office has since charged him with felony escape and issued a bench warrant for his return to Hawaii. 

As for Saito, he refuses to say whether he got any help escaping the hospital, where he obtained the fake ID he used at the airport, and  how he got the money to take him to California.    He does insist that his escape was meant to prove a point, however.   “I was surprised that it actually worked,” he said in an interview with Associated Press. “I was expecting almost every leg of the way, I was expecting them to be right around the corner just going to nab me.... “I had no delusions of settling down. That’s grandiose. I was just trying to get as much time as possible under my belt to prove my point that I could be in the community without supervision and not be truculent or violent or stupid.  I just wanted a track record to throw back into the hospital and say, ‘Look, nobody was there to supervise me. I was out. I didn’t drink. I didn’t drug. I didn’t hurt anybody,  

While he reported knowing that his money would run out at some point, he felt that the longer he stayed out, the more he could prove himself.  “I wanted to extend my time out there as much as possible, maximize my record, my track record, that would be in and of itself irrefutable proof that I was out there doing it,” he said.   He also insists that he had never been mentally ill but faked illness to avoid being sent to prison.  Ironically, his hospitalization likely worked against his plan of eventually reentering society as hospital staff consistently opposed his release.   As a result, he felt he had nothing to lose by escaping since the hospital would never give him a chance to live on his own anyway.  

"Whether this worked out or not, or whether it made things worse, what does it matter", he asked.  “I was riding that cab. The wind was blowing in my face. I was looking at all the lights in San Jose, and I actually felt human. And I thought to myself, ‘Oh my God, I’m a human being,'” 

 

 

The Succi Solution

Even though the 19th century had more than its share of hucksters offering miracle remedies for any disease you could name,  Giovanni Succi's name definitely stood out.   Instead of  offering a cure for rheumatism, consumption, or "female troubles,"   what Succi was even more wondrous:  a cure for hunger itself.   And he was willing to put this promised cure to the test.

Not that he was the first to make this sort of claim, mind you.  For whatever reason, inedia (from the Latin word for "fasting")  remained a hot topic throughout much of the 19th century.  Stories of "fasting girls" who could survive without food remained common in many places across Europe and North America.    Some 'hunger artists"  even put on regular shows during which they would demonstrate their "miraculous" ability to go without food.   During the mid-19th century, Londoners could pay a "voluntary" donation to see one particular faster, Bernard Cavanaugh, as he displayed his "powers of abstinence" to the world.   He was soon arrested after one of the spectators recognized him at a shop where he was buying a ham sandwich.  Though these claims continued to be successfully debunked,   new cases still had a way of coming out of the woodwork.  

Still, Giovanni Succi was a little harder to dismiss. Rather than grandiose claims of being able to go without food as a result of mystical training or a "miraculous" gift, Succi's strange ability stemmed from a special liqueur that he had supposedly discovered during his travels.  Though some sources suggest that the ingredients in the elixir were nothing more than chloroform, morphine, ether, and "Indian hemp",  Succi refused to confirm or deny this.

Born in Cesenatico, Italy in 1853, Succi's early life seemed unremarkable enough.   Working as a bank clerk in Rome, and later as a commercial agent who traveled extensively through much of Africa, it was there that he reportedly discovered the miracle liqueur that would make him famous.  Though he refused to say more about the elixir, he insisted that drinking it at regular intervals eliminated any need for eating food.   In fact, he claimed to be able to go without food for weeks at a time without any ill effects.

Beginning in 1886 while Succi was living in Milan, he offered to have himself tested by any medical doctors to prove his ability to go without food.   And many doctors took him up on his offer.   Following a two-week fast in Paris where he was reportedly watched at all times by a committee, he then moved on to a more ambitious challenge:  a 30-day fast in Milan and, later that same year, another 30-day fast in Paris.  This allowed him to win a 15000-franc wager and, perhaps as importantly, establish himself as a celebrity.

He followed up his earlier fasts with one in 1888 during which he was watched by members of Florence's Accademia Medico-Fisico.   Not only did he complete the fast with no apparent ill-effects, but the Accademia was impressed enough to confer a diploma on him afterward.   In a description of this miracle fast (which was published in Scientific American in 1888), the committee members who had overseen Succi's fast wrote:  "We the undersigned do certify that Signor Giovanni Succi of Censenatico in the Romagna, African traveler and explorer, has competed at Florence a fast of thirty days... We further declare that by his courageous experiment, and by his scrupulous fulfillment of every moral pledge undertaken by him towards us, Signor Succi has deserved well of science."   

Not surprisingly, newspapers across Europe and North America carried stories about Giovanni Succi and his strange ability to go without food.   It likely helped that he was an agile and muscular man with a striking appearance whose Italian looks appealed to female fans.   An 1890 fast at London's Royal Aquarium lasted forty days with Succi consuming nothing but water and his mysterious elixir (he also smoked two pipes a day with the occasional cigar).  By the end of his fast, he had lost more than 34 pounds in weight which, according to his personal physician, worked out to 26.5 percent of his original body mass.   Despite this dramatic weight loss, the medical experts who had been monitoring the fast found no evidence of medical  problems.   Succi pocketed 3000 UK pounds for that performance.  

Another famous fast took place that same year at the old Koster and Bial's Music Hall in New York City.   The spectacle began on November 5, 1890 and Succi, ever the showman, had a hearty meal before the fast was set to start.   According to one news story, his meal consisted of "anchovies, boiled trout, olives, celery, cressini, risotto, roast partridge, roast quail, grapes, pears, and a bottle of chianti."   From that point on, for the next forty-five days, he would have nothing more than his mysterious elixir and water.  Along with a committee of seven doctors who were charged with overseeing Succi's fast, there were numerous students from Bellevue Hospital as well as a crowd of spectators who had all paid admission to watch a man starve himself.  Presumably it must have been quite a show since thousands of people came to watch during the course of his fast.  When the fast ended on December 21, Succi was reportedly a "weak and miserable and pitiable object" though hundreds of people were packed in the hall waiting to hear the final results.  On being told that Succi had successfully completely the fast despite losing 40 pounds, the cheers of the audience shook the building.   He broke the fast with a sumptuous gourmet dinner and the newspapers carried full details of everything he ate.  Succi was a star, after all. 

Not all of his fasts were so successful however.  In 1892, he was back in London for a repeat performance at the Royal Aquarium, this time for a mind-boggling 52-day fast.  Unfortunately, he only lasted forty-four days before being forced to end the fast to take nourishment.   Despite this setback, he continued his fasting performances across Europe, sometimes along with fencing and foot-racing demonstrations to show that he remained in good health despite not eating.    During another 50-day fast in Vienna however, things didn't go so well and observers discovered food that had been smuggled to him.   This didn't end his career though and, to prove he wasn't a fraud, Succi arranged to have himself bricked up in a prison cell during another fast in Verona.   This time, he succeeded.

Still, the pressures of his continuous fasting eventually got to him.  In 1896, during a fast in Paris, Succi became deranged and began smashing everything within reach.   It took two police constables to restrain him and he sang Italian songs all the way to the police station.  Audiences were delighted with his antics though there was nothing fake about his mental state.   After a week in a local infirmary, he eventually returned to normal though his career was never quite the same.    By the early 1900s, "hunger artists" had fallen out of fashion and Succi found himself having trouble making ends meet.  One 30-day fast in Vienna only earned him twenty UK pounds, a pittance compared to what he used to make.   After being forced to quit his performances, he eventually ended up as an asylum attendant before dying destitute in Florence in 1918.   

Despite his sad end, Giovanni Succi managed to become part of popular culture.   Years after Succi's death, the celebrated traveler and writer Robert Ripley wrote about him in his syndicated "Believe It Or Not" column as "the Fast Man."  According to Ripley, Succi's 80 fasts worked out to an incredible 3200 days without food over the course of his stage career.    As well, Franz Kafka's 1922 short story, "The Hunger Artist" is believed to be based on Succi's career and his later downfall.   

While "breatharians" and their ilk continue to demonstrate their purported ability to go without food even today, none of them ever had the sheer panache or showmanship displayed by Giovanni Succi - king of the hunger artists. 

The Humanzee Project

It is still one of the most bizarre scientific experiments in history.  

While crossbreeding between species has been occurring for thousands of years, genetic dissimilarities between most animal species make successful crossbreeding extremely rare.   In the case of horse-donkey crossbreeds, for instance, mules (the offspring of male horses and female donkeys) and hinnies (the rarer offspring of male donkeys and female horses) combine the best elements of both parent species due to hybrid vigour.  Unfortunately,   mules and hinnies are almost always sterile given the different number of chromosomes in the two parent species.  While lion-tiger crossbreeds also exist, they invariably depend on human intervention to bring them into being and the same sterility issues usually apply.  For that matter, climate change has led to a significant rise in coywolves (coyote/wolf hybrids) and "grolar bears" (polar bear/grizzly hybrids) in recent years.  

But what about other highly similar species such as humans and chimpanzees/bonobos?   Despite the strong genetic similarities between homo sapiens sapiens and pan troglodytes/pan paniscus, the genetic differences between the species appears too great to allow any kind of viable intermating.  With the human genome containing 46 chromosones versus 48 for the chimpanzee/bonobo,  the gap seems no greater than the genetic difference between horses and donkeys.  As a result, the concept of deliberately creating a humanzee or a chiman has attracted a certain morbid interest despite the vast legal and ethic issues involved.     Genetic evidence has even suggested that interspecies sexual activity occurred long after the human and chimpanzee lineages diverged allowing chimpanzee genes to enter the gene pool of early humans.   While there have been rumours of humanzees, "missing links", and other human-animal crossbreeds occurring, no real evidence that humans and other species of primates could  be capable of producing viable offspring has ever surfaced. 

Still, by the turn of the 20th century, the distinction between humans and chimpanzees seemed far less rigid than it does now. Along with Charles Darwin's revolutionary contributions to biology, advances in genetics and comparative anatomy demonstrated that chimpanzees were far more similar to humans than anyone realized.    The primate research pioneered by Alexander and Nadiya Ladygina-Kohts at Moscow's Darwin Institute showed that chimpanzees were capable of the same sort of cognitive development previously seen only in human beings.   Such research, along with the radical discoveries of Ivan Pavlov,  suggested that even the most unlikely projects into human and chimpanzee intelligence might be attainable.

Which brings us to Ilya Ivanovitch Ivanov...

Born in 1870 in Russia's Kursk region, Ivanov went on to become one of Tsarist Russia's most prominent authorities in veterinary medicine and a pioneer in the use of artificial insemination in horse breeding.   Already a full professor at Kharkov University, Ivanov founded Russia's first institute for artificial insemination in 1901.   He also became well-known (or notorious in some circles) for his radical ideas on interspecies hybridization.    Using artificial techniques, Ivanov successfully created zebra-donkey and European bison-cow hybrids and demonstrated similar pairings with rodents.   But Ivanov had more ambitious plans in mind.   As early as 1910, he presented a paper at the World Congress of Zoologists raising the possibility of human-ape hybrids.   Though the Tsarist government had no interest in such a project, the Russian Revolution of 1917 would bring new opportunities.

It was during his time at the Pasteur Institute in Paris that Ivanov began planning the ape-human hybrid project that would make him notorious.   The Pasteur Institute had an experimental primate research station in French Guinea which Ivanov decided would be a perfect setting for his experiments.   All that remained was to seek funding from the Soviet government.    According to a 2005 news story describing Ivanov's project,  it was Joseph Stalin who had personally authorized the project stating that, "I want a new invincible human being, insensitive to pain, resistant and indifferent about the quality of food they eat."    Since the Red Army had been left dangerously depleted following the Russian revolution and the infighting that  followed, replacing them with human-ape hybrids seemed to make sense.   Creating strong, servile workers who did what they were told without complaining appeared to be the perfect way to complete Stalin's new Five-Year-Plan. 

Given that the Soviet Union was already carrying out massive social engineering projects including farm collectivization, egalitarianism, and industrialization,  Ivanov's project  seemed plausible enough to attraact funding.   According to Cambridge professor Alexander Etkind, another explanation for Ivanov's success in obtaining funding rested in the political value of demonstrating the link between humans and animals.   As Etkind pointed out in a 2008 paper:

If he crossed an ape and a human and produced viable offspring then that would mean Darwin was right about how closely related we are.   Ivanov’s approach to the government stressed how proving Darwin right would strike a blow against religion—Ivanov of course knowing that religion was something the authorities ‘were struggling to stamp out" which made his proposal all the more attractive.

Whatever the motivation, Ivanov received the equivalent of $1,000 to put his plan into action.   Using the Pasteur Institute's research station in Africa, the plan involved artificially inseminating female chimpanzees with human sperm.  The identity of the sperm donor is still unknown though Ivanov reportedly used the sperm of local men based on racial theories arguing that Africans were more closely related to apes than people of European stock.  Since there were no sexually mature chimpanzees already at the station, Ivanov was obliged to do his experiment with three female chimpanzees at the zoo in French Guinea's capital.    Not surprisingly, none of the chimpanzees became pregnant and Ivanov returned to the Soviet Union to continue his work there.

By this time, the Soviet government had built the Sukhumi Primate Centre near Stalin's birthplace in Georgia.   Intended to become a world leader in primate research, the Soviet government decided to use the centre to raise Ivanov's hybrids.  Still, his failure in Africa meant that Ivanov needed to move on with the next stage of his project:   artificially inseminating human females with chimpanzee sperm.    That failed as well when the last postpubescent male chimpanzee available to him in Sukhumi died.   To keep his project alive, Ilya Ivanov decided on a new, and more desperate, gamble.   He wrote a Cuban heiress named Rosalie Abreu requesting her help with his breeding experiments.   Abreu had a large ape colony outside Havana and was well-known for her success in breeding chimpanzees in captivity. 

In his letter, Ivanov requested a male chimpanzee for use in impregnating a female subject known to history only as "G".    Though  Abreu was initially agreeable to the proposal, she quickly changed her mind after approaching Charles Smith of the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism for funding.   It was Smith who leaked the story to the press with explosive results.  The New York Times reported the story under the headline, "Soviet Backs Plan To Test Evolution" and the Ku Klux Klan began crusading against the entire project.  They even went so far as to threaten Abreu since the entire project was "abominable to the Creator."    She quickly withdrew her support.

While he was still trying to find another chimpanzee breeder, Ivanov found the political climate in the Soviet Union changing rapidly.   Presumably Stalin was no longer so enthusiastic about human-ape hybrids and the tide turned against Ivanov and his experiments.   By 1930, Ivanov and many of his fellow scientists at Sukhumi lost their positions and he came under political attack.  Whether he was deemed to be an embarassment to Stalin or simply due to bad luck, Ilya Ivanov was arrested and sentenced to five years in exile in Kazakhstan.   His sentence put him to work at the Kazakh Veterinary Zoologist Institute though his science career was effectively over.  He died of a stroke on March 20, 1932 as he was waiting for a train to Moscow. 

Despite an obituary written by Ivan Pavlov, Ilya Ivanov's place in the history of science is hard to determine.    His achievements with animal breeding and artificial insemination are still noteworthy but  it his "humanzee" project for which he is best remembered.   The Sukhumi Primate Centre remains active though the stigma of Ivanov's long-ago experiments continue to linger.   Along with media accusations that the Centre was founded by Stalin for the purpose of raising human-ape hybrids, the breakup of the Soviet Union also brought accusations of other bizarre experiments conducted there.     During the 1990s, after Russian science fiction writer, E. Parnov, managed to gain access to many documents about the Centre's founding, he published his findings with various speculations about the type of research that researchers carried out with Stalin's full approval.  While there is no evidence that any human-ape hybrid experiments had actually been conducted there (largely because Ivanov could not find a sexually mature ape), the centre seemed to have no shortage of human volunteers.   According to some sources, they were beseiged with letters from willing subjects but no actual experiments took place prior to Ivanov's arrest.

Though most of these media stories were largely exaggerated,  they also called attention to the legitimate primate research at Sukhumi that Western researchers would not see until decades later.   The centre was also the hub of some of the Soviet Union's most ambitious biomedical research including tests of the Sabin polio vaccine and treatment of radiation poisoning.   It also became the model on which the U.S. National Primate Research Centers were based (and similar centres around the world).    Since the end of the Soviet Union, the centre continues to do research though economic hardship has meant a large reduction in staff and resources.

Still, that the centre exists at all can be viewed as a testament to the cutting-edge primate research done there.   Though the lingering stigma of Ilya Ivanov continues to give the centre an undeserved media notoriety,  the researchers there can claim enough legitimate achievements to earn respect from primatologists around the world.  

Ivanov and Stalin never got their ape-men but  the legacy that the centre leaves behind is likely far more important.

 

 

 

 

 

 

How Do Parents Assess Problem Media Use in Children?

 

There is certainly is no disputing that children are putting in more media time than ever.  Along with televisions, smartphones, texting, and video games, many children now have personal computers, digital music players, and the Internet to fill every waking moment.  And evidence suggests that even toddlers and preschoolers now joining the digital masses.  

Still, despite repeated warnings from public health experts and researchers, actual research looking at how addictive digital media really is remains fairly limited.  In fact, up to now, much of that research has focused on video games addiction.  Based on available research, the American Psychiatric Association has even proposed a new diagnosis, Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD).   Based on other forms of addictive behaviour such as problem gambling, symptoms that might indicate IGD  include:  spending excessive amounts of time online, inability to control use, loss of interest in other activities, etc.   

But can these same symptoms be applied to other kinds of screen media use?  And can those symptoms appear differently in children under the age of twelve than they do in adolescents?  A new research article published in the journal Psychology of Popular Media Culture attempts to answer both of these questions. 

To read more, check out my new Psychology Today blog post.

Can Posttraumatic Headaches Predict Recovery From Concussions?

Since post-traumatic headache is one of the most prevalent and long-lasting post-concussion sequelae, causes significant morbidity, and might be associated with slower neurocognitive recovery, a new study in the Journal of Headache and Pain evaluated  the use of concussion screening scores in a concussion clinic population to assess for post-traumatic headache. Using a retrospective cross-sectional study of 254 concussion patients from the New York University (NYU) Concussion Registry, data on the headache characteristics, concussion mechanism, concussion screening scores were collected and analyzed. Results showed that 72% of the patients had post-traumatic headache. About half (56.3%) were women. The mean age was 35 (SD 16.2). 90 (35%) patients suffered from sport-related concussions (SRC). Daily post-traumatic headache patients had higher Sport Concussion Assessment Tool (SCAT)-3 symptom severity scores than the non-daily post-traumatic headache and the headache-free patients (50.2 [SD 28.2] vs. 33.1 [SD 27.5] vs. 21.6 SD23], p < 0.001). Patients with SRC had lower headache intensity (4.47 [SD 2.5] vs. 6.24 [SD 2.28], p < 0.001) and SCAT symptom severity scores (33.9 [SD 27.4] vs. 51.4 [SD 27.7], p < 0.001) than the other patients, but there were no differences in post-traumatic headache prevalence, frequency, and Standardized Assessment of Concussion (SAC) scores. Researchers concluded that the presence and frequency of post-traumatic headache are associated with the SCAT-3 symptom severity score, which is the most important predictor for post-concussion recovery. The SCAT-3 symptom severity score might be a useful tool to help characterize patients’ post-traumatic headache. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved)

For the abstract

Can Sleep Apnea Increase The Risk of Alzheimer's Disease?

A new research study suggests that elderly people dealing with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) may have an increased risk of developing Alzheimer's disease (AD).    The study, which was recently published in the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, examined OSA due to previous research suggesting that it might accelerate cognitive decline in people at risk for AD.  According to lead researcher Ricardo S. Osorio, MD, assistant professor of psychiatry at New York University School of Medicine, proving a causal link has been difficult up to now since OSA and AD often share risk factors and commonly coexist.

The study examined 208 participants aged 55 to 90 using a series of clinical tests including sleep testing to monitor breathing while they slept.   None of the participants had been previously diagnosed with OSA or had other medical conditions that might have affected study results.   Results showed that more than half of the participants had some form of OSA with 16.8 percent having moderate to severe breathing problems at night. 

Of these, 104 participants then took part in a two-year study that included undergoing lumbar punctures to obtain cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) as well as PET scans to measure amyloid beta plaque deposits in the brain. Amyloid beta is a peptide that has been implicated in the development of cognitive problems linked to dementia.  Research findings showed a significant correlation between OSA severity and decreased amyloid beta peptides in the CSF over time as well as increased amyloid deposits in the brain.

Surprisingly enough however, OSA doesn't appear to predict cognitive deterioration in healthy adults.  According to study coauthor Andrew Varga of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York, the measures use may not pick up on the very subtle cognitive changes often found in the very early stages of AD.   As for cognitive changes that can be detected, there is no reliable way of telling them apart from the cognitive problems linked to lack of sleep.

Though much more research is needed, these results suggest that standard OSA treatments such as CPAP, dental appliances, and positional therapy may help delay dementia in older adults.  "Results from this study, and the growing literature suggesting that OSA, cognitive decline and AD are related, may mean that age tips the known consequences of OSA from sleepiness, cardiovascular, and metabolic dysfunction to brain impairment," Dr. Osorio said in a recent interview. "If this is the case, then the potential benefit of developing better screening tools to diagnose OSA in the elderly who are often asymptomatic is enormous."

Considering that AD and other forms of dementia already affect millions of people worldwide, a number that will certainly increase as Baby Boomers grow older, finding better ways of helping patients cope with memory loss can play a critical role in future health care.

For more information.

 

 

 

The Strange Case of the Sleeping Man

On June 7, 1888, newspapers across the midwestern United States carried an odd story.   Titled, "Herman Harms Awakens At Last From His Long Slumber", the story described how Utica, Minnesota farmer was finally awake after a very long nap.   How long you ask?   Well, at the time of his awakening, he had been sleeping steadily for the previous six years and that was far from the first of the long naps he had taken.

Born in Hanover, Germany in 1838, he emigrated to the United States in 1869 and eventually settled St. Clare, Illinois.   A strong, healthy man, he earned enough through his labour to buy two prosperous farms along with supporting his wife, Geske, and growing family.   With no history of previous medical issues or health  problems in his family, there was certainly nothing remarkable about Herman Harms's life until his strange medical problem first began.    He certainly didn't have any unhealthy habits since he completely abstained from tobacco and alcohol.   In spite of all this however,  he was struck down with a mystery illness in 1875.  Given the initial symptoms  he displayed (fever, chills, and sweating), one doctor diagnosed him with "ague", a common term for malaria at the time.   After weeks of bedrest, his symptoms had become so severe that his family sent all the way to St. Louis for a specialist who could help.   But none of those very expensive doctors were able to do much for him.

Largely out of desperation,Harms decided to take the advice of one doctor who advised him to sell off his property and move to Minnesota.  According to this piece of medical advice, the "bracing atmosphere of the northern Minnesota climate would drive the ague and malaria from his bones."    And it worked (temporarily).    After transplanting his family to St. Charles, Minnesota where he bought a new farm,  Harms appeared to make a complete recovery and was soon working as hard as ever. Unfortunately, this respite only lasted three years when he was struck by a high fever of unknown origin.  Fearing that his ague had returned, his wife began tending him as she had before.  He then sank into a deep sleep that would last for years.   

As for what was happening to cause this long sleep, nobody had any idea.   Along with the numerous medical doctors called in by the Harms family, their farm became a target for curiosity-seekers all hoping for a glimpse of the "Minnesota Marvel" and newspapers across the country compared his case to the Washington Irving story of Rip Van Winkle.   Through it all, Herman's wife, Geske, (who never seems to be identified by name in these news stories) continued to act as his full-time nurse.   Also, given that this was in an era before intravenous feeding,  keeping him from starving to death in his sleep remained a major problem.  Though family members and friends were able to force some meat into his throat, he always vomited it up again.   It was only at midnight, when his sleeping state seemed lightest, when Geske was able to rouse him enough to feed him the little gruel she was able to get him to swallow.  Since this was hardly enough for a grown man his size,  he began wasting away.   

And then, three years after his strange sleep first began, Herman Harms woke up again and seemed incredulous when his family told him he had been asleep for so long.  He was only convinced after seeing his haggard face in the mirror and the amount of weight he had lost.   Though he tried to make up for lost time by working steadily around the farm, he had a relapse three months after first waking up.   According to his wife who described what happened to a reporter, he just fell to the floor in a heap one day and only responded dazedly when she told him to lie down on the sofa where he then fell asleep.   Nobody thought anything was seriously wrong until the following morning when they tried to wake him for breakfast.  

Through all of this,  his family had to deal with the financial consequences of Herman Harms' long sleep.  This included the eventual loss of their farm and having to move to Utica, Minnesota where they were primarily supported by Harms' eldest son.   As for Geske, she continued to care for her husband except for six months when he was transferred to a hospital for the insane in Rochester.   Due to his lack of progress there, she then took him home where he remained ever since.

In an 1888 news story released just a few months before Harms' new awakening, a reporter described what he saw when he visited the sleeping man.   "Today, the man who ten years ago weighed 190 good, round, pounds would no more than balance the beam at the eighty pound notch.  He is hardly more than a skeleton."   He also described Harm's "mass of unkempt hair as black as night" and eyes that were "sunken under heavy black eyebrows."   The reporter noted that his eyelids moved "up and down with a nervous restlessness that is noticed only in the orbs of the Albino."  The article went on to describe other quirks such as the sleeping man's including feet that remained cold no matter how they were wrapped, an immunity to pain (even when a pin was stuck in his body), and changes in his breathing depending on the amount of moisture in the air.  

Before giving up on medicine completely, the Harms family allowed numerous bizarre remedies to be applied, including one attempt to wake him by running an electric current through his extremities (it didn't work).  By 1888 however, his wife had long since given up trying to get her husband to take medication (most of which they could no longer afford anyway).  As for his dramatic awakening in 1888 that generated headlines across the country, that didn't seem to last long either and he was soon asleep again within months.   And this is pretty much the pattern he would follow for the rest of his life according to later news stories.  Life eventually became a little easier for Herman and his wife as their adult children became old enough to support their aging parents.  They were even able to move to a new farm owned by their oldest son.   Despite that, Herman's brief awakenings hardly seemed to matter considering how frail his long sleep had left him.   Along with his weakened muscles, his digestive organs had long atrophied to the point of not being able to take in anything more substantial than gruel.   Through it all, he continued to cling to life and the last news story I could find about this strange case had him still sleeping away in 1899.    A search of grave records suggests he died in 1916 at the age of 78,  ironically outliving Geske by two years.  Whether he died in his sleep or not isn't recorded.

So what can be said about this strange case?  None of the countless doctors who had assessed him over the years had ever been able to come up with a satisfactory diagnosis.   While his symptoms seem to suggest some form of encephalitis lethargica , a.k.a., "sleeping sickness", there is no way to becertain.   Despite the publicity surrounding the Minnesota Marvel (including numerous offers from sideshow promoters to put him on display), his case is virtually unknown today.  All that can really be said about Herman Harm's case is that it demonstrates the very human cost involved when a bizarre illness such as this can strike without warning.    Not to mention the terrible burden often assumed by devoted family members as a result.

 

The Chloroform Man

All Horace Wells ever wanted was to relieve the pain of his dental patients.   He probably should have quite while he was ahead.

Born in 1815, he attended schools in Hampshire and Massachusetts before deciding to become a dentist.  Since there were no formal dental schools at the time, Wells received his training by serving an apprenticeship with several practicing dentists in Boston.  After a brief period as a traveling dentist, he established a permanent practice in Hartford, Connecticut in 1836.   By 1838, Wells was a well-known dentist in the community and had even made a name for himself among other dentists with his An Essay on Teeth, Comprising a Brief Description of Their Formation, Disease, and Proper Treatment.   Although his practice was successful, Wells was frequently distressed by the pain that his patients experienced.  Early nineteenth-century dentistry was frequently agonizing for patients since there was no reliable method of anesthesia available.   Due to the medical risks involved, opium (and, later morphine) could not be safely administered for tooth extraction and alcohol had its own drawbacks.  Looking into other methods,  Wells stumbled onto a possible solution while attending a very unusual lecture.   

When nitrous oxide was first discovered by Joseph Priestley in 1772, its properties weren't immediately obvious.  First named "nitrous air" by Priestley, the colourless, non-flammable gas had a sweet odour and taste.   In his later research, Humphrey Davy discovered that the gas had anesthetic properties (ironically enough, he had a wisdom tooth removed and found that nitrous oxide relieved the pain).  Although Davy commented on nitrous oxide's potential role in surgery in a 1799 book, nothing really came of it at first.   Still, the euphoric feeling experienced after inhaling nitrous oxide quickly earned it the nickname of "laughing gas".  For the next few decades, nitrous oxide was popular for the recreational high it brought and "laughing gas" parties became popular, first with British aristocrats and gradually spreading to both sides of the Atlantic.    According to the 1839 flier advertising a typical party, "The gas will be administered only to gentlemen of the first respectability. The object is to make the entertainent in every respect a genteel affair" (although you have to wonder how "genteel" the guests became after too much nitrous oxide intoxication).  More serious lecturers even provided nitrous oxide cannisters in lecture halls so the audience could sample its effects themselves. 

It was at an 1844 lecture by Professor G. Q. Colton where Wells tried laughing gas for the first time and realized that it could be useful for tooth extraction.  After seeing another audience member injuring himself and showing no pain while under the influence, Wells decided to experiment further.    He arranged a demonstration with Colton on the following day in which Wells had his own tooth extracted using nitrous oxide.  Wells was excited by the success of the experiment and later commented that, "I did not feel it so much as the prick of a pin.  A new era in tooth pulling.  It is the greatest discovery ever made".  Unfortunately, a followup demonstration that he had arranged for other Boston dentists and medical students was unsuccessful because he accidentally turned off the nitrous oxide too soon.  The patient sat up and screamed and the audience walked out after declaring Wells' discovery to be a hoax.    Despite this setback, Wells continued his experiments and successfully used nitrous oxide with his own patients.

In the meantime, other developments were happening in Europe.  The analgesic properties of chloroform and ether had long been known but it was only during the 1840s that physicians and dentists began using them for surgical operations.  After  Wells' former partner, William T.G. Morton, first used ether for tooth extraction at Massachusetts General Hospital in 1846, newspapers in Boston widely praised him for his medical discovery.  Painless surgery had suddenly became popular (Queen Victoria helped the process along in 1848 by asking for chloroform during the birth of her seventh child)  and a battle quickly developed over who should should have the credit for inventing anesthesia (the term was coined by Oliver Wendell Holmes in that same year).  Although Horace Wells tried to have his own work recognized, he faced stiff opposition from the Boston medical community (they regarded Morton as one of their own and wanted Boston to be recognized as the birthplace of anesthesia).  It was as much a matter of money as prestige since Morton also tried to patent his anesthetic which would have made him a wealthy man. 

With an aggressive campaign to have his early experiments in nitrous oxide recognized, Wells established his place in medical history after traveling to France and presenting his claim to the French Academy of Medicine.   Although Wells' pioneering work was eventually recognized, his life quickly went downhill after his successful return from France in 1847.    Since chloroform provided a safe alternative to ether, Wells began his own experiments which involved self-administering the drug in large dosages.  The toxic effects of chloroform exposure were not well understood at the time and Wells became increasingly deranged.  According to his obituary,  Wells was approached by a patient who had apparently asked him for some "vitriolic acid" to help him "pay back a loose female, who injured his dress".  He and the patient prepared a spray bottle of acid and squirted it on the woman in question.  When the patient suggested "continuing the sport" with other women, Wells refused and went home.    Unfortunately, Wells continued inhaling large doses of chloroform over the next few nights.  According to the confession that he left behind,

"I lost all consciousness before I removed the inhaler from my mouth.  How long it remained there, I do not know, but on coming out of the stupor, I was exhilarated beyond measure, exceeding any thing I had ever before experienced, and seeing the phial of acid, I seized it and rushed into the street and threw it at two females, I may have thrust it at others but I have no recollection farther than this.  The excitement did not leave me for some time after my arrest."

Wells made no attempt at defending himself and was primarily worried about what would happen to his wife and child.  Confined to a small cell in New York's notorious Tombs jail, Wells had somehow managed to smuggle in a razor and, after anaesthetizing himself with a dose of chloroform that he had poured into a handkerchief, he cut the femoral artery on his left thigh.  When his body was finally found on January 24, there was a pool of blood in the floor of the cell as well as several sheets of paper on which he had written his confession as well as a final note to his wife.  In that note, he explained his suicide on the grounds that he was fast "becoming a deranged man or I would desist from this act.  I can't live and keep my reason and, on this account, God will forgive my deed.  I can say no more".  The note also gave instructions for his burial and disposal of his personal effects.

Although Horace Wells' final letter requested that he be buried in secret, he was interred at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Hartford Connecticut.  William Morton and the Boston medical community played on the bizarre circumstances of Wells' death to reinforce Morton's claim as being the inventor of anaesthesia.  It would take many years, and vigorous lobbying by Wells' supporters, before the American Dental Association and the American Medical Association formally recognized Horace Wells as a pioneer.  Monuments to Wells have been raised in Paris and in Hartford, Connecticut.    Nitrous oxide continues to be used as an anesthetic and, ironically in Wells' case, it has been successfully used in treating certain types of addiction including alcohol withdrawal.

And yes, laughing gas parties are still around (perhaps too much so).