FDR and GBS
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May 17, 2007 at 11:14 am
I just saw research suggesting that FDR never had polio but in fact had a severe case of GBS. I am trying to learn more as he was a hero of mine and finding out he had GBS is fascinating to me. Any body hear of this before? Jeff
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May 17, 2007 at 11:20 am
Funny you should mention that, I believe someone posted that same question a couple of weeks ago! Dawn 😮
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May 17, 2007 at 12:10 pm
Yes, we did discuss this subject last year sometime. Guess we will never know for sure.
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May 17, 2007 at 1:01 pm
Jeff, I googled ‘President Roosevelt GBS’ and hit a site [url]www.byeDr.com[/url]
I have heard that FDR had GBS, too.
This site explains the theory that FDR did have polio but may also have contracted GBS. Good reading… -
May 17, 2007 at 1:07 pm
I posted info I got on a website about 2 weeks ago. The researchers said that his symptoms did not match Polio in that Polio doesn;t attack middle aged people nor does it do the same thing to you. I believe I read that he got sick after having an infection too. That’s not like Polio either.
The post here started out about Truman. I found it.
[url]http://www.gbs-cidp.org/forums/showthread.php?t=2398&highlight=Truman[/url]
Trudy, natesmom -
May 17, 2007 at 3:34 pm
There was a program on the Discovery Channel about FDR and GBS a couple of years ago. It just happened to be about a month before my gbs hit.
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May 17, 2007 at 7:31 pm
[B]If I am not mistaken, FDR had visited a Polio camp for children before he became ill. The Polio virus is highly contagious and adults can get it from an infected person. Polio is a disease of the nervous system, spreads to other areas of the body.The infection he had, could have been the polio virus.[/B]
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May 18, 2007 at 4:19 pm
Maybe FDR didn’t have polio, scientists say
Friday, October 31, 2003 Posted: 12:50 PM EST (1750 GMT)Cut and paste the following link:
URL([url]http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/10/31/roosevelt.polio.reut/index.html[/url]) -
May 18, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Here is another commentary on the story:
Did President Franklin Delano Roosevelt have polio (as history tells us) or did he have Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS)? Researchers from the University of Texas believe that FDR was misdiagnosed with polio when in reality he had GBS. First of all, FDR was diagnosed with “polio” at the ripe old age of 39, which is a tad old for polio to be diagnosed. Rarely does polio occur in individuals over the age of 30. Guillain-Barré syndrome was described in the medical literature in 1916 and FDR was diagnosed with polio in 1921. The researchers believe that many physicians had not even heard of GBS in 1921. Since polio symptoms are similar to the symptoms of GBS, his physician may have made a mistake based on the “prevailing” disease of the times. The Texas researchers studied Roosevelt’s symptoms as well as epidemiological records from the early 20th century and found that it was statistically more likely that he had Guillian-Barré. Would this information have been useful to his physicians in 1921? Nope. The treatment for GBS was unknown at the time so the outcome of his disease would have been the same—whether the diagnosis was polio or GBS. (Journal of Medical Biography, November 2003)
Jeff
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May 18, 2007 at 10:13 pm
My neurologist swears it was GBS, because of the presenting symptoms.
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May 18, 2007 at 11:29 pm
I am currently reading Dr. Gareth Parry & Dr. Joel Stienberg’s new book simply entitled “Guillain Barre Syndrome” & they talk about whether or not FDR had GBS or polio. Apparently many of the world’s top neurologists on GBS have studied this issue & come to the conclusion that FDR probably did have polio, although I am not sure exactly why. They didn’t really elaborate much on the issue…
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