Medical Oddities

I've found myself lethargic of late, and perhaps you'll forgive me for my tardiness in this manner. I promise to post more.

Earlier, I was watching 20/20 and I saw an interesting little bit on a woman named Jill Price. You all know the stories about those autistic savants who can recall the day of the week and the weather if you give them a date, and at first I thought that was her deal. But the interviewer began asking more in-depth questions, as in the clothes she was wearing and the television shows she watched that day. And she remembered all of them. This is a woman who never forgets anything. Doctors first tested her with old TV Guides, asking what day of the year the final episode of M*A*S*H aired, or when the Seinfeld episode about the close-talker was on. At one point she appeared to have answered a question wrong, but after some consideration, she told them that the book was off by a week. Sure enough, she was more accurate than TV Guide about a show that had been off the air for over two decades. Here's an ABC News video about her. I saw this and remembered about two other medical oddities I had come across.

The first was about Brooke Greenberg, a fourteen year old in Maryland. She was born prematurely, and at first her parents were worried about her, but she ended up growing perfectly well until she was about one year old. Developmentally, she still maintained the appearance and mental acuity of a six-month old. And here we are, over ten years later, and she's still (for all intents and purposes) a six-month old. What appears amazing is that is she not only a perpetual baby, she also has fended off multiple ailments that doctors have claimed would kill her. When the story first shown on Dateline on 2001, she was dismissed as a hoax. Four years later, an update was aired, almost erasing all doubt. You can probably find a copy on YouTube. Weird.

Lastly is a Vietnamese farmer named Thai Ngoc. After recovering from a fever in 1973, he found himself unable to go to sleep. For 35 years, the man hasn't slept at all. This is the original Vietnamese news report, and this is the (much more in-depth and convincing) one that was written after a BBC film crew followed him around for a while. Über-weird.