Book Review: Gesundheit

Book Review: Gesundheit

Author: Patch Adams (Hunter D. Adams, M.D.)

Author’s web site: https://www.patchadams.org/gesundheit/

Date: 1998

Publisher: Healing Arts Press

ISBN: 0-89281-781-X

Length: 193 pages text, 34 pages reference material

Illustrations: black-and-white photos

Quote: “Health is based on happiness—from hugging and clowning around to finding joy in family and friends, satisfaction in work, and ecstasy in nature and the arts.”

Not everyone who watched Robin Williams play Patch Adams, M.D. realized that there was a real Gesundheit Institute. There was, and the worst thing about it was that Patch Adams was born in 1945. Which means he’s reaching retirement age.

In this book, Dr. Adams describes his philosophy of medical practice. It’s about wellness, not just banishing one particular symptom. Not everyone wants to strip for an examination from a doctor who’s likely to clown in the office—all the way to wearing a squeaker-balloon nose—and not all cancer patients appreciate “Tumor Humor,” but laughing is known to stimulate the body’s production of safe natural pain suppressants. Since Adams also avoided raising people’s blood pressure by giving them bills, letting them pay what and when they felt they ought to pay, some Creative Tightwads thought the comedy approach was worth trying.

Patients and doctors who agreed to try a holistic approach experimented with using a house for that purpose for a few years. Then legal concerns caused Adams to stop offering treatment to new patients and focus on raising funds for a "proper hospital" that would meet regulatory demands. Adams agreed to the making of the movie in order to raise those funds and, to his disappointment, neither actors nor producers actually donated revenue from the movies to the hospital. 

There is still no physical Gesundheit Hospital where patients can pursue holistic or naturopathic healing free of charge and pay when they're able to go back to work. There may never be one. If there is, it will need to be organized in a realistic, post-socialist way. "Patch" Adams himself is still clinging to a fantasy that "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" can work beyond a small voluntary community of people united by religious beliefs. I, myself, would be more than satisfied to see it being made to work by a few such communities.