| What can we learn from people who, medically | | | | These types of findings are a nightmare to medical |
| speaking, should have died but didn't? June is one of | | | | researchers. Researchers only want to have a couple |
| these. She was not expected to survive the cancer | | | | of variables. Then they want to be able to measure |
| in her hip at 21, and certainly wasn't expected to | | | | these with a scientific test, or simple questionnaire to |
| survive for decades after her first lung metastases | | | | thousands of people in order to prove or disprove |
| occurred. She had less than one chance in 100, or | | | | whether one of the variables can be shown to be |
| even less than one chance in 1000 of surviving with | | | | important to recovery. Having some 50 variables or |
| an excellent quality of life. So how could that happen? | | | | components makes it impossible to prove a theory |
| Doctors are very happy when one of their patients | | | | one way or the other. |
| does much better than expected. But they tend not | | | | But isn't that part of what makes up human? We are |
| to explore the issue of one amazing case, as their | | | | all incredibly complex beings. Why should we ever |
| time is taken up on those cases which "really" need | | | | expect healing to be able to be reduced down to |
| their care and attention. Others will suggest that an | | | | one or two or three components? |
| unexpected recovery was due to a "late effect of | | | | June lived a very different life to others in the study. |
| treatment" or perhaps to spontaneous regression of | | | | The 50 odd components of resiliency did not mean |
| the tumour. | | | | she was a clone of any of the others in the group. |
| However the really important thing to know is | | | | June was a lovely older woman, with a strong |
| whether survivors like June have anything in common | | | | religious faith that was very important to her. On one |
| or whether there they are so different that we | | | | occasion she had a miracle disappearance of a tumor |
| cannot say anything useful. | | | | and there was a full medical inquiry after the |
| The first thing to acknowledge is that they are very | | | | "unnecessary surgery" found no evidence that there |
| different as people. Both males and females survive | | | | ever had been a tumor there at all. |
| unexpectedly. Some come from high social status | | | | June had known they would find nothing when they |
| work, some are manual workers, some are trades | | | | operated but as she had no proof she felt that she |
| people, teachers, performers, and probably every | | | | couldn't tell the surgeon and oncologist that God had |
| type of employment. Some come with a lot of | | | | healed her overnight. That type of conversation was |
| education, some with very little. | | | | not the sort that she felt that she could have with |
| June had just qualified as a music teacher when she | | | | her medical carers at the time. However she was |
| first went down with cancer and later became a | | | | able to discuss it with the surgeon the next time the |
| single parent in the late 1950s in a conservative | | | | secondaries returned. |
| community. Her family assisted with childcare as she | | | | Most in the study had less dramatic remissions of |
| went back to work to support her son. | | | | their condition. But for each person personal resilience |
| The second thing to acknowledge is that despite | | | | was about living life to the fullest day by day |
| being very different personalities and with very | | | | according to their values. |
| different backgrounds survivors are people with a lot | | | | The wonderful thing about personal resilience is that |
| in common. A major study published in March 2008 in | | | | we don't need to prove it to scientific standards |
| the Qualitative Health Research journal explored | | | | because resilience is all about living the life that the |
| Personal Resilience, that quality which all of the | | | | person really wants to live. It is not a treatment that |
| survivors had. | | | | has to be proved by randomized controlled trials. It is |
| Personal resilience had five major dimensions which all | | | | about each person being true to themselves, fully |
| participants had to develop and continue during the | | | | connected to life in its various components and living |
| time they were ill and afterwards. Each of these | | | | moment by moment for every day they have left. |
| dimensions were further subdivided into more than | | | | Moment by moment, day by day, and for each of |
| 50 components all of which were necessary - none | | | | these the weeks stretched into months and years, |
| were optional. | | | | and for June, into decades. |