Desiree Jennings, the cheerleader with the bizarre affliction of "dystonia" she attributes to receiving a seasonal flu shot, has made an amazing recovery.
She now has her own website, here: http://www.desireejennings.com/ But the good news is here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,565984,00.html?test=late stnews or http://tinyurl.com/yg5s95c The doctor responsible for this remarkable achievement, Rashid Buttar, is a practitioner of alternative medicine including urine injection therapy, according to this site: http://tinyurl.com/yfmex5r He also is known as an anti-vaccination advocate. The treatment which restored Ms. Jennings is the controversial "mercury detoxification" technique known as chelation therapy The site above links to an interesting blog by a clinical neurologist named Steven Novella at the Yale University School of Medicine. ( http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=1195 ) He suggests that Ms. Jennings' condition is most consistent with a diagnosis of psychogenic dystonia; that is, her symptoms indicate a psychological rather than a physiological origin of her disorder. Dr. Novella makes the interesting observation that because Ms. Jennings recovered so rapidly (within 36 hours) in response to an unscientific treatment which is likely a placebo, this provides support for the psychogenesis hypothesis. Giving credit where it's due, I have to point out that in an early post on this topic, Beth Benoit warned us that her husband, an orthopedic surgeon, expressed reservations about this case, although he did use the politically impolite term "hoax" rather than the kinder "psychogenic" designation. Me, I voiced reservations too, but I tended to believe her symptoms were "real" (giving a workout to scare quotes). I shouldn't have. Stephen ----------------------------------------------------------------- Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology, Emeritus Bishop's University e-mail: [email protected] 2600 College St. Sherbrooke QC J1M 1Z7 Canada ----------------------------------------------------------------------- --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
