Thomas is a 15-year-old boy with cognitive delays and autistic traits. He was suffering from terrible tooth pain that kept him from eating, but he absolutely refused to sit in the dentist's chair. After years of untreated cavities, his parents, Roberto and Orietta, were desperate. To help them find a solution, the Community Dentistry team at Piove di Sacco hospital in Padua worked with the family to understand how they might make the dental visit easier. The approach is called "narrative medicine" — it means discovering what passions your patients have, then using those interests to overcome the fear and mistrust that doctors and hospital settings can trigger in some people. In Thomas's case, the key was simple: he was obsessed with Star Wars. So the doctors decided to transform the hospital into the spaceship from the famous sci-fi saga. Thomas became Captain Darth Vader, complete with a lightsaber, and the medical staff bowed as he passed. The dental office became the control room; the operating theater became the spacecraft Darth Vader would use to embark on new adventures.
This way, Thomas was able to undergo all his clinical exams — blood tests, an electrocardiogram, anesthesia consultations — and had surgery twice under general anesthesia. He has since recovered fully and eats normally. "Every child with a disability is approached with empathy, along a path designed just for them, always different," Claudio Gallo, head of Special Dentistry at Piove di Sacco, told the Corriere del Veneto. "I'm opposed to any form of restraint — methods still used in other hospitals on disabled people. Medieval practices that cause needless suffering and deep trauma to those who endure them and those who apply them. This way, instead, we create empathy. Care becomes something positive. Today Thomas greets me with a hug. I'm his friend."
The Special Dentistry ward at Piove di Sacco is one of three centers in the Veneto specializing in treatment for people with disabilities. Each year it serves 800 children and 2,000 adults from across Italy.
The story may sound light — it might even raise a smile — but it tells us something serious and important about access to care for people with relational disabilities. It suggests that health services need enough flexibility to respond to all patients, whatever their needs. This rarely happens. It almost never happens. Before arriving at Piove di Sacco, Thomas and his parents traveled between many hospitals without resolving anything. This means that the right to care for some people with disabilities is systematically denied — or met only through restraint, when it could be avoided. I'm not suggesting we go over to the Dark Side and declare war on hospitals, but treating the right to care for all people with disabilities as a priority, and demanding it more firmly, should be possible in our world too. (Simona Lancioni)
Source: Informare un'H