ER Does Multiple Personality
What do you suspect when a patient you treated just a few hours ago returns to the ER and then claims to have no recollection of having been there before? On ER, Dr. Archie Morris was soon convinced his patient had Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), formerly known as Multiple Personality Disorder.
When Clyde Sandberg first enters the ER (during last week's episode, Jigsaw) he seems on edge, almost too tuned in to the sights and sounds around him. Suddenly, he drops to his knees in front of a little boy who is playing cars on the floor and starts talking to him and playing with the cars as well.
The boy's mother draws her son away from the stranger, and this seems to further agitate the man. He starts to freak out and bangs on the window separating the triage nurse from the waiting room, cursing and pointing out that there is a room full of people who need help out there. He says, "All I got's a little congestion. Think you morons can handle that?"
Nurse Sam comes to the rescue and gives him the forms he needs.
Next, we see him behind the curtain being examined by Dr. Morris. He continues to insist he has the flu, but tests show that there is a problem with his heart. It is twice the size it should be, and he has developed a pericardial effusion, which is why he's having trouble breathing. (X-rays also show that the man has many old, healed fractures. And, he is covered with cigarette burn scars.) He's going to need the fluid drained through a pericardial tap.
When he hears this news, Sandberg leaps from the bed and storms out of the ER, yelling, "Let me the hell outta here!"
Later on, two men are brought in by ambulance after having a violent altercation. Morris is surprised to find that not only is one of the men Sandberg, but that he claims he has no memory of being in the ER earlier that day. He says his name is Willis Peyton.
When told about his condition, he readily agrees to the pericardial tap. However, just as Morris is getting ready to do the procedure, a kid in the ajoining room begins to scream and flail around, triggering Clyde to come back. He begins cursing and refuses the treatment yet again.
Soon after, Morris approaches the ER's resident Rock Doc, Ray Barnett, and tells him he has found out that Peyton has been to the ER many times over the years due to childhood abuse. He believes Peyton has DID and wants Barnett to agree to join him in "double-doctoring" Peyton, but he refuses. (The term "double-doctoring" was not explained on the show. The only reference I could find to "double-doctoring" is that it refers to patients who visit different doctors in order to obtain prescriptions for controlled substances.)
Dr. Pratt also refuses to take part in "double-doctoring" (whatever that is), and suggests that Morris simply treat conservatively and wait on the psych consult.
In the meantime, Nurse Sam is talking to Sandberg/Peyton and offering him a little tough love. She explains that if he doesn't have the fluid drained from around his heart he could die. She says she knows he's scared and hurt, but he's in a safe place.
He looks at the light and his demeanor changes again. Peyton is back. He asks, tentatively, if he was sleeping. Sam says, "No." He sighs and says he has lost time again. She gently tells him about dealing with Clyde. Then, she explains again the urgent need for him to have the procedure but that they can't do it without Clyde's permission.
Sam provokes Clyde to come to the forefront. She tells him that Peyton isn't a coward like he is, which prompts him to give in.
After the procedure, Morris comes in to visit and it is obvious right away that the personality there on the bed is neither Peyton nor Clyde. In a small, fearful voice, he tells Morris his name is Andre and says, "Don't tell my dad I'm here. Okay?"
As the show ends, Andre says, "It's kinda dark in here. You're not going to leave are you?" Morris reveals a glimpse of the doctor he has the potential to be when he pushes his stool closer to the bed and kindly assures his patient, "I'm here all night."
Though Mulitple Personality Disorder has come a long way since the days of Sybil in the 1970s, some mental health professionals still seem to be skeptical.
WebMD's sister site, eMedicine.com, states:
POLL: Do you think DID is real? Why or why not?
Related Topics: Healing the Doctor-Patient Relationship>
Technorati Tags: Dissociative Identity Disorder, DID, ER, Multiple Personality
When Clyde Sandberg first enters the ER (during last week's episode, Jigsaw) he seems on edge, almost too tuned in to the sights and sounds around him. Suddenly, he drops to his knees in front of a little boy who is playing cars on the floor and starts talking to him and playing with the cars as well.
The boy's mother draws her son away from the stranger, and this seems to further agitate the man. He starts to freak out and bangs on the window separating the triage nurse from the waiting room, cursing and pointing out that there is a room full of people who need help out there. He says, "All I got's a little congestion. Think you morons can handle that?"
Nurse Sam comes to the rescue and gives him the forms he needs.
Next, we see him behind the curtain being examined by Dr. Morris. He continues to insist he has the flu, but tests show that there is a problem with his heart. It is twice the size it should be, and he has developed a pericardial effusion, which is why he's having trouble breathing. (X-rays also show that the man has many old, healed fractures. And, he is covered with cigarette burn scars.) He's going to need the fluid drained through a pericardial tap.
When he hears this news, Sandberg leaps from the bed and storms out of the ER, yelling, "Let me the hell outta here!"
Later on, two men are brought in by ambulance after having a violent altercation. Morris is surprised to find that not only is one of the men Sandberg, but that he claims he has no memory of being in the ER earlier that day. He says his name is Willis Peyton.
When told about his condition, he readily agrees to the pericardial tap. However, just as Morris is getting ready to do the procedure, a kid in the ajoining room begins to scream and flail around, triggering Clyde to come back. He begins cursing and refuses the treatment yet again.
Soon after, Morris approaches the ER's resident Rock Doc, Ray Barnett, and tells him he has found out that Peyton has been to the ER many times over the years due to childhood abuse. He believes Peyton has DID and wants Barnett to agree to join him in "double-doctoring" Peyton, but he refuses. (The term "double-doctoring" was not explained on the show. The only reference I could find to "double-doctoring" is that it refers to patients who visit different doctors in order to obtain prescriptions for controlled substances.)
Dr. Pratt also refuses to take part in "double-doctoring" (whatever that is), and suggests that Morris simply treat conservatively and wait on the psych consult.
In the meantime, Nurse Sam is talking to Sandberg/Peyton and offering him a little tough love. She explains that if he doesn't have the fluid drained from around his heart he could die. She says she knows he's scared and hurt, but he's in a safe place.
He looks at the light and his demeanor changes again. Peyton is back. He asks, tentatively, if he was sleeping. Sam says, "No." He sighs and says he has lost time again. She gently tells him about dealing with Clyde. Then, she explains again the urgent need for him to have the procedure but that they can't do it without Clyde's permission.
Sam provokes Clyde to come to the forefront. She tells him that Peyton isn't a coward like he is, which prompts him to give in.
After the procedure, Morris comes in to visit and it is obvious right away that the personality there on the bed is neither Peyton nor Clyde. In a small, fearful voice, he tells Morris his name is Andre and says, "Don't tell my dad I'm here. Okay?"
As the show ends, Andre says, "It's kinda dark in here. You're not going to leave are you?" Morris reveals a glimpse of the doctor he has the potential to be when he pushes his stool closer to the bed and kindly assures his patient, "I'm here all night."
Though Mulitple Personality Disorder has come a long way since the days of Sybil in the 1970s, some mental health professionals still seem to be skeptical.
WebMD's sister site, eMedicine.com, states:
DID is thought to begin in childhood in response to repeated traumatic and/or overwhelming life experiences, most of which involve physical and sexual abuse. Other traumatic events include long and painful childhood medical experiences and wartime dislocation. In studies of patients with DID, a range of 70% of patients to more than 95% of patients reported childhood abuse. However, some patients cause controversy because they revise their histories as treatment progresses.
POLL: Do you think DID is real? Why or why not?
Related Topics: Healing the Doctor-Patient Relationship>
Technorati Tags: Dissociative Identity Disorder, DID, ER, Multiple Personality
11 Comments:
Yes DID is real, and it is often misrepresented in the media..most portrayals of those with DID are the most extreme, or downright wrong! The majority of us live among you and blend in..it is our abiltiy to disociate and become what is needed that helped us survive, and exist in the world in general. We are intellegent, creative, and there are many who suffer without help, or are misdiagnosed and fail to recieve the correct treatment. DID is closely related to PTSD and is caused by the severe physical, more often sexual abuse in early childhood. It is NOT schizophrenia, which is a neurological disease, nor is it like Bipolar disorder, which is, at least according to the psychiatric profession, a chemical imbalance in the brain. DID often does not respond well to medications...tho these can be helpful at times to control some symptoms. With appropriate therapy and support there has been great success. This takes time, however, and money, and as mental health is the most underfunded (despite supposed new parity with physical health care coverage), most agencies, hospitals, insurance companies, medicare/medicaid, are unwilling to deal with it. The one place in this entire northwest area that actually had a sucessful program, at Lake Chelan Hospital has closed the program due to the decreased funding, to pursue more profitable areas of medicine and treatment. Many of the Psychiatrists (mostly in the agencies that treat lower income individuals), often find they are only able to medicate the symptoms...often they miss DID all together, and along with others who have treated the person, become like blind men trying to describe an elephant..by only touching one part...they will treat depression, or what they see as psychotic symptoms, or anxiety, and so on...never seeing the big picture. Many of these physician's hands are tied by lack of funds, therapists, ect...But there are still many who outright deny the existance of DID, and refuse to even discuss it..(except maybe condesendingly, humoring a "delusion" in their eyes). So the answer to the question is YES! and there is hope, in fact more hope for those with DID who get proper treatment, compared with the prognosis of those with other serious mental health conditions.
I'm not sure what to think of DID.
I think is sure has become really popular though to have as a diagnosis and i wonder about that just like i wonder about the gillions of litle kids who were diagnosed with add and adhd who really don' thave it. but the teachers want robots for students.
I thought the "double-doc" comments referred to some legal requirement that two doctors sign off that the patient was incompetent to refuse the needed treatment. I could be wrong.
Those of us who have lived with a person with DID know the condition is real. The person I married had four distinct personalities. Thanks to an extemely knowledgable psychotherapist my husband is much more stable, but it has take five years of therapy for him to integrate everything into one personality.
Yes DID is very real.I have 8 different personality. They range from an 6 yr to a 42 yr. I am 46 I have been sexually abuse since I was 5. I now know that without my "alters" I wouldn't have made it.
My alters have protected me and have also made it possible for me to go to college ,get married and raise 2 sons.
DID is as real as cancer. Some recover from it by integrating, while others will always be seperate. There is no medical cure, the only cure is to stop childhood traumas. I suffered a childhood of sexual, physical and emotional abuse, yet became a devoted mother of two that I vowed would never be treated the same way I was. So there are now two wonderful adult women who are not DID due to childhood abuse. It's a very small number I realize, but it is a start. It is also testament to the fact that not all ABUSED grow up to be abusers themselves, the cycle can be stopped. I have seven known personalities ranging from age 2 to age 48. I say known because many personalities hide until they feel it is safe to come out. The psychiatric profession knows so little about this condition and many are very unsympathetic about it. When a person is told they are DID, our first response is, it's not true, we are just crazy. During most therapy sessions I have been through, none of them deal with the causes of my DID. The professional fields need to start taking DID seriously and learn how to help those of us who have it.
If you watch the movie "identity" that will show you about the disease. The whole movie is about a man with the disease and has 8 different personalities. It starts off as a horro movie but later you can see how it relates. It is very good and it helped me understand the disease even more.
I would love for someone to prove DID is not a real diagnosis. Having been given this diagnosis several years ago I deal with it daily. I think the programs who wish to show this as a topic on their TV shows should do more in depth study to make the show as accurate as possible and not make it out as a joke as so many do.
As a 12 year old with 16 distinct personalities, the most common reactions that I get is that I'm making it all up or that I am a person to be avoided- so most of the people I interact with have no idea that I'm split. I agree with the above statements that if the media is going to continue putting on movies and shows involving DID, they need to do their research. Although I love the movies for their story lines and suspence, I'm sick of my disorder being portrayed as 'crazy' and 'dangerous' (Who can forget the end of Identity?) As far as it being over-diagnosed, I can't disagree more, at least where I am. My therapists have treated me for everything but, even though my symptoms are textbook. However, I know how to deal with my girls and we're getting along fine, making it through college and having a normal life.
That last comment was me... I'm 21. Not 12. Sorry. You'd think by 21 we'd know how to type...
I know an 18 year old girl with DID. She has 3 different personalities. She is not in treatment at this time. Is it normal for people with DID to have problems with loved ones telling them no? My husband and her family are in the process of getting her help (against her will) and I wonder if there is really any hope for this situation. If there is, please respond.
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