Oliver Sacks
Oliver Sacks | |
|---|---|
 Oliver Sacks in 2005. | |
| Born | July 9, 1933 |
| Years active | 1966 - present |
| Known for | popular series of books about cases and patients |
| Medical career | |
| Profession | physician |
| Sub-specialties | neurology |
Oliver Wolf Sacks, CBE (born July 9, 1933, London), is a British neurologist residing in the United States, who has written popular books about his patients, the most famous of which is Awakenings, which was adapted into a film starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro.
Early life and education
Sacks is the fourth and youngest child born to a prosperous North London Jewish couple: Sam, a physician, and Elsie, a surgeon. When he was six years old, in 1939, his parents sent him from London to a boarding school in the Midlands, where he remained until 1943. [1]
In 1954, Sacks earned a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in physiology and biology from The Queen's College, Oxford University. At the same institution, he went on to earn in 1958, a Master of Arts (MA) and an MB ChB in chemistry, thereby qualifying to practice medicine.
Professional life
| Neuropsychology |
|---|
 |
After converting his British qualifications to American recognition (i.e., an MD as opposed to MB ChB), Sacks moved to New York, where he has lived since 1965, and taken twice weekly therapy sessions since 1966.[1]
In 1966, Sacks began working as a consulting neurologist at Beth Abraham Hospital (now Beth Abraham Health Services), a chronic care facility in the Bronx. It was here that he first encountered a group of patients, many of whom had spent decades unable to initiate movement due to the devastating effects of the 1920s sleeping sickness, encephalitis lethargica.[2] His work at Beth Abraham provided the foundation on which the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function (IMNF), where Sacks is currently an honorary medical advisor, is built.[citation needed] In 2000, he was honored with the IMNF’s Music Has Power Award for his contributions towards advancing knowledge of the power of music to awaken and heal, and again in 2006 to commemorate his 40th year at Beth Abraham and recognize his dedication to its patients.[citation needed]
Sacks was formerly a clinical professor of neurology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, adjunct professor of neurology at the New York University School of Medicine, where he worked for over 43 years.[citation needed] On September 1, 2007, he became professor of clinical neurology and clinical psychiatry at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, leading that department while serving as Columbia University's first "artist"—a new position the university hopes will help bridge the gap between disciplines such as medicine, law, and economics.[3] He remains a consultant neurologist to the Little Sisters of the Poor, and maintains a practice in New York City.
Literary work
Sacks considers that his literary style follows the tradition of 19th-century "clinical anecdotes," a literary style that included informal case histories, following the writings of Alexander Luria[4] as well as Hughlings Jackson.[citation needed]
In 2007, Columbia University, where Sacks serves as Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry, appointed Sacks as "its first Columbia artist, a newly created designation."[3]
Sacks describes his cases with little clinical detail, concentrating on the experiences of the patient (in the case of his A Leg to Stand On, the patient was himself). The patients he describes are often able to adapt to their situation in different ways despite the fact that their neurological conditions are usually considered incurable.[5] His most famous book, Awakenings, upon which the movie of the same name is based, describes his experiences using the new drug L-Dopa on Beth Abraham post-encephalitic patients in 1969. Awakenings was also the subject of the first film made in the British television series Discovery.
In his other books, he describes cases of Tourette syndrome and various effects of Parkinson's disease. The title article of The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is about a man with visual agnosia and was the subject of a 1986 opera by Michael Nyman. According to a Letter to the Editor published by the Journal of autism and developmental disorders, the exact details in the book should not be taken literally and there are alternate, skeptical views.[6] The title article of An Anthropologist on Mars is about Temple Grandin, a professor with high-functioning autism. In his book The Island of the Colorblind he describes the Chamorro people of Guam, who have a high incidence of a form of ALS known as Lytico-bodig (a devastating combination of ALS, dementia, and parkinsonism). Along with Paul Cox, Sacks is responsible for the resurgence in interest in the Guam ALS cluster, and has published papers setting out an environmental cause for the cluster, namely toxins such as beta-methylamino L-alanine (BMAA) from the cycad nut accumulating by biomagnification in the flying fox bat.[7][8]
Sacks's writings have been translated into 21 languages, including Catalan, Finnish, and Turkish. He was awarded the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science in 2001.[citation needed] Oxford University awarded him an honorary Doctor of Civil Law degree in June 2005.[citation needed] In March 2006, he was one of 263 doctors who published an open letter in The Lancet criticizing American military doctors who administered or oversaw the force-feeding of Guantanamo detainees who had committed themselves to hunger strikes.[9]
Awards and mention
He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2008 Birthday Honours.[10]
Books
- Migraine (1970)
- Awakenings (1973)
- A Leg to Stand On (1984) (Sacks' own experience of losing the control of one of his legs after an accident.)
- The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (1985)
- Seeing Voices: A Journey into the Land of the Deaf (1989). Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-06083-0.
- An Anthropologist on Mars (1995)
- The Island of the Colorblind (1997) (total congenital color blindness in an island society)
- Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood (2001)
- Oaxaca Journal (2002)
- Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain (2007)
Essays and articles
- "The Mind's Eye (Oliver Sacks)" (positive experiences of blind people) - published in "The Best American Essays 2004", Ed. Robert Atwan
References
- ^ a b Andrew Brown (5 March 2005). "Oliver Sacks Profile: Seeing double". The Guardian.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help) - ^ Music Has Power Awards Event Journal, Institute for Music and Neurologic Function, November 2006
- ^ a b Motoko Rich (1 September 2007). "Oliver Sacks Joins Columbia Faculty as 'Artist'". The New York Times.
The appointment grew out of conversations that Dr. Sacks had with several people, including Eric Kandel, a Nobel laureate in medicine and a professor at Columbia, and Gregory Mosher, director of the Arts Initiative at Columbia, which aims to incorporate an interdisciplinary approach to the arts into the undergraduate experience.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help) - ^ All in the Mind (2 April 2005). "The Inner Life of the Broken Brain: Narrative and Neurology". Radio National.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help) - ^ Sacks, Oliver (1996-01-12) [1995]. "Preface". An Anthropologist on Mars (New Ed ed.). London: Picador. pp. xiii–xviii. ISBN 0-330-34347-5.
The sense of the brain's remarkable plasticity, its capacity for the most striking adaptations, not least in the special (and often desperate) circumstances of neural or sensory mishap, has come to dominate my own perception of my patients and their lives.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help) - ^ Yamaguchi M (2007). "Questionable aspects of Oliver Sacks' (1985) report" (PDF). J Autism Dev Disord. 37 (7): 1396, discussion 1389–9, 1401. doi:10.1007/s10803-006-0257-0. PMID 17066308.
{{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter|month=ignored (help) - ^ Occurrence of beta-methylamino-l-alanine (BMAA) in ALS/PDC patients from Guam, National Institutes of Health, October 11 2004
- ^ Cycad neurotoxins, consumption of flying foxes, and ALS-PDC disease in Guam, National Institutes of Health, November 26 2002
- ^ Forcefeeding and restraint of Guantanamo Bay hunger strikers, The Lancet, Volume 367, Number 9513, March 11 2006.
- ^ "No. 58729". The London Gazette (invalid
|supp=(help)). 14 June 2008.{{cite magazine}}: Check date values in:|date=(help)
External links
- Oliver Sacks website
- 1989 audio interview with Oliver Sacks at Wired for Books.org by Don Swaim
- Wired article (04/2002)
- New York Times Op-Ed by Oliver Sacks regarding the Island of Stability theory
- The Mind Traveller
- New York Times Op-Ed piece about encephalitis lethargica.
- 2007 video of Oliver Sacks discussing his book Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain (10/27/2007)
- article in TATE ETC. Summer 2007 including exclusive stereograph of his first photograph, taken at age 12