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Hannah Pettis October 30, 2012 Nursing 500

When the Spirit Catches You 1. I learned After reading the novel by Anne Fadiman, I learned that the title of the book was a Hmong metaphor: Quag dab peg or the spirit catches you and you fall down. In our dictionary this phrase is generally translated as epilepsy. Although the Hmong too consider it an illness, the explanation of the illness really captures the essence of the Hmong culture in a way we cannot quite understand. The Lees reflected on this phrase with a particular instance that occurred in Lias life when she was three months old. Her older sister Yer slammed the front door and the Lees apartment and Lia was frightened by this noise. A few moments later her eyes rolled to the back of her head and she began to convulse. Eventually she fainted, and the Lees knew exactly what had caused this episode. The noise of the door had frightened her soul leading it to flee from her body and become lost. A soul stealing dab had taken her own away, leaving her to become a shaman. She would be given the power to perceive things other people cannot see, as well as facilitating their entry into trances, a perquisite for their journeys into the realm of the unseen. Their attitude toward seizures brings up an interesting alternative to medicine that Americans at the time would consider ludicrous and out of the question. They would essentially consider this rationality an inferior complex that the Hmong made up when in reality it is their belief system. This metaphor is an excellent example of how culture sensitivity needs to be recognized in reference to medicine. The language barriers the Americans had between the Lees essentially lost the meaning of this metaphor and completely misdiagnosed Lia by providing ampicillin instead of anticonvulsants. If the doctor had taken the time to understand their culture and background with a translator, this problem may have ultimately been avoided. 2. I relearned The different stages of seizures and their level of severity in regards to epilepsy. Epilepsy is a sporadic malfunction of the brain, sometimes mild and sometimes severe, sometimes progressive and sometimes self-limiting, which can be traced to oxygen deprivation during gestation, labor, or birth; a head injury; a tumor; an infection; high fever; stroke, or even a drug allergy. A small seizure is a focal seizure that elicits hallucination or twinges in the body but retains consciousness. When the electrical disturbance is spread to a wider area, it is considered a generalized seizure: consciousness is lost, either for the brief episodes called petit mal or absence seizures, or for the full blown attacks known as grand mal. Epilepsy cannot be cured, just completely or partially controlled in most cases with anticonvulsant drugs.

3. This reminds me of/ makes me wonder When my mother went to Haiti to help with the aftermath of the Earthquake/ Tsunami catastrophe. She told me stories of patients she was trying to save but could not understand their condition or health due to the language barrier between the American and Haitian culture. She said she constantly was searching for a translator that could explain details to her about families who came to her in distress but she could not understand what they were saying. The problem of being misdiagnosed in Haiti during the time was common and the organization of the tents set up for patients were terrible. 4. I dont understand
Why the CPA takes Lia away from her parents at the suggestion of Neil Ernst. She

didnt do well even in a good foster home, and her developmental delays became more pronounced. Her seizures increased and only the hospital in Turlock, where the Kordas lived, was finally able to reduce her medication and stabilize her enough that she went home. The unfortunate aspect of this situation is that Lia almost seems like a guinea pig upon home the American medical system was trying to find its way through medical and cultural problems while the Hmong were just trying to be respected and taken seriously.

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