Poliomyelitis:

Poliomyelitis:

A highly infectious viral disease that chiefly affects children and, in its acute forms, causes inflammation of motor neurons of the spinal cord and brainstem, leading to paralysis, muscular atrophy, and often deformity.

In 1952 Dr.Jonas Salk started testing a Vaccine for this disease.  In 1955 testing began on humans and seemed promising. In 1957 a World wide effort was started to vaccinate all children in an effort to stop the spread of this disease.

I remember the nurses coming to my school to put a sugar cube into our mouths containing the vaccine.  I took it but it was much too late to help me. In the late summer of 1954, at the tender age of seven, I contracted Polio, as it was called.

It was the Sunday of the last holiday of the summer, Labor Day, and we were all outside playing on the stoop and rolling down the hill in our front yard.  I remember it like it was yesterday. We all played with the knowledge that in a couple of day’s school would start.

The next morning I woke up with a headache, stiff neck, and a slight limp in my left hip. My mother took me to the local clinic to see a Dr. They checked me out and told her that I must have hurt myself playing the night before. They sent me home.

The next morning I woke up and had to call my mother because I could not lift my head from the pillow or even get out of bed at all.

Off we went to the E.R. where the Dr. performed a spinal tap and determined that I had a case of Bulbar Polio that was also in my spine. The Bulbar referred to my brain stem.

I was transferred, by car, to Saint Elisabeth’s Hospital in Youngstown, Ohio. I remember not being able to move much as I lay with my head in my mother’s lap in the back seat of our car. I told her not to worry because I had little pain and felt things were not that bad.

I spent seven days in isolation without any visitation from my parents. My dad was allowed to view me through a glass window. My mother was pregnant with my sister and was told not to go to the hospital.

After the seven days I was moved to a ward with other boys that also had polio. I had little feeling and had sand bags attached to my shoulders in an effort to keep them in place. They wanted to move up toward my ears why? I don’t know. My legs and arms also had sand bags attached to them in an effort to keep them straight and elongated.

I had to lie on my back all day long except when I received physical therapy or received my three shots each day. Every night they would lay me on my stomach and place a hot wool blanket on my back for some reason. I was also taken for a whirlpool bath every other day. Although I had little pain I also had little movement because the polio was in my spine.  I also had bulbar polio in my brain stem that could have affected my breathing. There were days that they thought they would have to put me into an Iron Lung.

I was told later that I did so well because I never cried for my mother like other kids did. They said I told the nurses that my mom was going to have a baby and if she came to see me the baby could die. I also told the nurses that after I left the hospital my dad was going to buy me a brand new red bike of my choice!

I spent six long weeks there and was released in the middle of October. I had to stay in bed most of the day because I had little strength. I was able to return to school in Feb. of that year. I was in the second grade.

My mother tells me that I came back a different child. I was weak, skinny, and my personality was not the same happy sure child I was before.

When I look back on the whole affair I must admit that I was never scared or worried. I did what the Doctors told me and never complained. I was never the alpha boy or leader I was before I got sick.

On a positive note I did get that bike from my dad. I have to thank my mom for praying for me every day, my Aunt Shirley and Uncle Jack for watching me when my mom had her baby and my Father George. He came to Youngstown to see me every night after work. He must have been tired but he never left me alone. He came every night.

Well, that’s my story and I ‘m sticking to it.