By Ashley McLeod, Staff writer
Nov 13, 2015, 16:43
COLONIAL HEIGHTS — The stories of detective Sherlock Holmes, a fictional character written by physician Arthur Conan Doyle, are very well known across the globe.
Doyle’s writings told the story of Detective Holmes, who along with his assistant Dr. Watson, solved mysteries from 221B Baker Street in London. The popularity of these two characters has continued to stand the test of time; their stories are still read, and in the years since more than 200 films have been made about the characters, as well as multiple television shows.
Decades after Doyle wrote his stories about Holmes, an American physician and journalist began writing a column for the New York Times called Diagnosis, where she laid out symptoms of patients, giving readers a chance to try and figure out the diagnosis.
Television producer Paul Attanasio, came across this column in the newspaper and was inspired by the premise behind it. Attanasio spun the idea behind the column into a medical procedural drama, which became a favorite among television viewers.
“House,” which ended up running for eight seasons on the Fox network, was a direct result of the writings of Lisa Sanders, an assistant clinical professor of internal medicine and education at the Yale school of medicine. Sanders became an integral part of the show, as it was based on her column.
Sanders, who visited Colonial Heights High School to discuss her book “Every Patient Tells a Story: Medical Mysteries and the Art of Diagnosis” with students, said the character of Dr. Gregory House is the “Sherlock Holmes moved to the 21st century.”
“The way ‘House’ came about, is a guy named Paul Attanasio read my column and he thought, why can’t we make a mystery story like these mystery stories where instead of having people who are the murderers, robbers. We have germs and other medical problems that are doing things,” said Sanders.
According to Sanders, the end of the 19th century was a hard time for medicine.
“When Arthur Conan Doyle started writing these stories, there was no way to make a diagnosis. You had no way to confirm what you thought was going on. No test to tell you that you were right. But even more important than that, even if you had the right answer, there were no treatments,” said Sanders.
This, in her opinion, is the reason why Holmes was written as a detective and not a doctor.
In her book, as in her column, Sanders explores the process of diagnosing patients, and the investigation and questioning that goes along with it, much like Sherlock Holmes did in Doyle’s stories.
The stories in her book are all real events that have happened to patients.
“These are mysteries that can be solved and make a difference,” said Sanders.
Sanders told the students that being a doctor is not always as clear cut as you would think.
“I think that people think that doctors just know. … I think that people think that doctors are like computers. You tell them your symptoms and it’s obvious. Medicine can sometimes be like that, but often it’s this figuring out process that makes it so exciting, so interesting,” said Sanders.
Sanders told the students that figuring out a diagnosis is much like an investigation that
Sherlock Holmes would do. You have to listen to the patient and investigate the different possible reasons why the patient may be experiencing their symptoms, ruling out possibilities as you go.
“You have to think, ‘what’s the worst thing it could be?’ And then you have to move up from there,” said Sanders. “So much of that data comes from the patient’s story.”
“That is how you really understand the world around you,” Sanders said about the importance of the story.
Understanding what the patient is going through is a clear way to figure out what the problem is, and their story is an important aspect of practicing medicine.
Students from Hopewell High School came to Colonial Heights High School for the discussion with Sanders on her book of medical mysteries. The students are a part of the Author Visitation Program, which started at Virginia State University about 20 years ago.
The program allowed students to read a science-based book and then meet and discuss the book with its author.
Instructional specialist for Colonial Heights Public Schools Joe Douglas said that the school system began participation in the program about five years ago, and this was their first year as host for the event.
Students read Sanders book during the summer and prepared several projects on the book which were presented to Sanders at the event. The projects highlighted the same idea as Sanders book, the importance of the relationship between a doctor and their patient, and also the importance of the doctor paying attention to their patient, in order to form a clear diagnosis.
