
The Miracles Doctors in Highland, Rome Have Witnessed
In hospitals and clinics across Highland, Rome, Lazio, a quiet revolution is taking place — one that challenges the long-held assumption that faith and medicine occupy separate and incompatible worlds. Dr. Scott Kolbaba's "Physicians' Untold Stories" documents this revolution through the voices of physicians who have witnessed firsthand the intersection of spiritual practice and physical healing. These are not preachers or faith healers but board-certified doctors who discovered, through their clinical experience, that the spiritual dimension of patient care is not merely a matter of bedside manner but a factor that can influence medical outcomes in ways that science is only beginning to understand.

About the Author
Dr. Scott J. Kolbaba, MD is an internist at Northwestern Medicine in Wheaton, Illinois. He interviewed more than 200 physicians about their most extraordinary experiences.

Physicians' Untold Stories
by Scott J. Kolbaba, MD • 4.5 stars (1018 reviews)
Miraculous experiences doctors are hesitant to share with their patients, or ANYONE!
Order on Amazon →"I just read your book and was inspired, moved, entertained. I can't wait to share this book with premeds." — D.G., Ophthalmology Professor, University of Illinois
Medical Fact
A study of 70,000 women found that regular church attendance was associated with a 33% lower risk of death from any cause.
Physician Burnout & Wellness Near Highland, Rome
Physicians practicing in Highland, Rome, Lazio work at the intersection of modern medicine and experiences that resist explanation. In conversations that rarely leave the break room or the on-call suite, doctors in and around Highland, Rome have reported encounters with phenomena that their training never prepared them for — from patients who describe verifiable details about events that occurred while they were clinically dead, to deathbed visions shared simultaneously by multiple family members, to recoveries that defy every prognostic model available.
The medical community in Highland, Rome includes physicians across every stage of their careers — residents navigating the exhaustion of training, mid-career practitioners balancing clinical demands with family life, and veteran physicians carrying decades of experiences that challenge the boundaries of conventional medicine. Burnout touches all of them differently, but a common thread runs through: the desire to remember why they chose medicine in the first place, and the rare but profound moments that remind them.
Physician Burnout by Specialty
Percentage reporting at least one symptom (Medscape, 2024)
Medical Fact
Hospital clown programs reduce pre-operative anxiety in children by 50% compared to sedative premedication alone.
Faith, Medicine & the Unexplained in Highland, Rome, Lazio
Polish Catholic communities near Highland, Rome, Lazio maintain healing devotions to the Black Madonna of Czestochowa—a tradition brought across the Atlantic and sustained through generations of immigration. Hospital rooms in Polish neighborhoods sometimes display replicas of the icon, and patients who pray before it report a comfort that transcends its artistic merit. The Black Madonna heals homesickness as much as physical illness.
Christmas Eve services at Midwest churches near Highland, Rome, Lazio—candlelit, hushed, with familiar carols sung in harmony—produce a collective peace that spills over into hospital wards. Chaplains report that Christmas Eve is the quietest night of the year in Midwest hospitals: fewer call lights, fewer complaints, fewer codes. Whether this reflects the peace of the season or simply lower census, the effect on those who remain in the hospital is measurable.
Medical Fact
Knitting and repetitive crafting activities lower heart rate and blood pressure while increasing feelings of calm.
Ghost Stories and the Supernatural Near Highland, Rome, Lazio
The Eastland disaster of 1915, when a passenger ship capsized in the Chicago River killing 844 people, created a concentration of ghosts that persists in medical facilities throughout the Midwest near Highland, Rome, Lazio. The temporary morgue established at the Harpo Studios building is the most famous haunted site, but the Eastland's dead have been reported in hospitals across the Great Lakes region, as if the trauma dispersed geographically over time.
Lake Michigan's undertow has claimed swimmers near Highland, Rome, Lazio every summer for as long as anyone can remember. The ghosts of these drowning victims—many of them children—have been reported in lakeside hospitals with a seasonal regularity that matches the drowning statistics. They appear in June, peak in July, and fade by September, following the lake's lethal calendar.
Did You Know?
Hospital chaplains are trained to support patients and families of every faith — and no faith at all.
Near-Death Experiences Reported by Physicians Near Highland, Rome
Community hospitals near Highland, Rome, Lazio where physicians know their patients personally are uniquely positioned to document NDE aftereffects—the lasting psychological, spiritual, and behavioral changes that follow near-death experiences. A family doctor who's treated a patient for twenty years can detect the subtle shifts in personality, values, and life priorities that NDE experiencers consistently report. This longitudinal observation is impossible in large, rotating-staff medical centers.
The Midwest's public radio stations near Highland, Rome, Lazio have produced some of the most thoughtful NDE journalism in the country—long-form interviews with researchers, experiencers, and skeptics that treat the subject with the same seriousness applied to agricultural policy or education reform. This media coverage has normalized NDE discussion in a region where public radio is as influential as the local newspaper.
Near-Death Experience Features
Percentage reporting each feature (van Lommel et al., 2001)
Did You Know?
Many of the physicians in Dr. Kolbaba's book initially refused to share their stories, fearing damage to their professional reputations.
Watch Dr. Kolbaba Share These Stories
Did You Know?
Dr. Kolbaba once grew a 1,000-pound pumpkin and won the Sycamore, Illinois pumpkin-growing contest two years running.
Rome: Where History, Medicine, and the Supernatural Converge
Rome's supernatural tradition spans nearly three millennia. The ancient Romans were deeply superstitious, consulting augurs, interpreting omens, and honoring the Lares and Penates—household spirits believed to protect families. The city's extensive catacombs, where early Christians buried their dead and held secret services, are permeated with accounts of ghostly encounters. The Capuchin Crypt, with its artistic arrangements of human bones, blurs the line between sacred art and the macabre. Roman tradition holds that Emperor Nero's ghost haunted the area of the Piazza del Popolo until a church was built there to contain his spirit. The Vatican itself has generated accounts of supernatural phenomena, including reported Marian apparitions and the miracle of incorrupt bodies of saints. Rome's Ponte Sisto bridge is said to be haunted by the ghost of Pope Sixtus IV, who commissioned it.
Rome's medical legacy extends back to antiquity. Roman military hospitals (valetudinaria) established the concept of organized medical care, and the writings of Galen, who practiced in Rome in the 2nd century AD, dominated Western medicine for over 1,300 years. The Ospedale di Santo Spirito, founded in 727 AD, became the model for medieval Christian hospital care. During the Renaissance, Rome's anatomists advanced the understanding of the human body despite papal restrictions on dissection. The Vatican's Bambino Gesù hospital, founded in 1869, is one of Europe's premier pediatric institutions. Rome is also the administrative center of Catholic medical ethics, with the Vatican's Pontifical Academy for Life shaping bioethical debates on issues from euthanasia to stem cell research.
About the Book
Several readers have reported that the book changed their fear of death into curiosity and peace.
Notable Locations in Rome
The Capuchin Crypt: Located beneath the Church of Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini, this crypt contains the skeletal remains of 3,700 Capuchin friars arranged in elaborate decorative patterns, and visitors have reported ghostly monks walking among the bones.
The Roman Catacombs: These vast underground burial networks, including the Catacombs of San Callisto and Domitilla, hold the remains of hundreds of thousands of early Christians and martyrs; visitors have reported ghostly apparitions and unexplained phenomena in the tunnels for centuries.
Castel Sant'Angelo: Originally built as Emperor Hadrian's mausoleum in 139 AD and later used as a papal fortress and prison, this castle is reportedly haunted by the ghosts of executed prisoners and the emperor himself.
Ospedale di Santo Spirito in Sassia: Founded in 727 AD by order of Pope Ina of Wessex, Santo Spirito is one of the oldest hospitals in Europe and served as the model for charitable hospital care throughout Christendom for centuries.
Policlinico Umberto I: Opened in 1904, this is Rome's largest hospital and the principal teaching hospital of Sapienza University, one of the oldest universities in the world (founded 1303).
Ospedale Bambino Gesù: Founded in 1869, this is the Vatican's own children's hospital—the Holy See's pediatric facility—and one of the largest pediatric research hospitals in Europe.
About the Book
The book addresses the professional stigma that prevents physicians from discussing spiritual experiences in the workplace.
How This Book Can Help You
Emergency medical technicians near Highland, Rome, Lazio—the first responders who arrive at cardiac arrests in farmhouses, on roadsides, and in grain elevators—will find their own experiences reflected in this book. The EMT who performed CPR in a snowdrift and felt something leave the patient's body, the paramedic who heard a flatlined patient whisper 'not yet'—these stories are the Midwest's own, and this book tells them with the respect they deserve.

Reader Ratings Distribution
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Research Finding
Physicians have the highest suicide rate of any profession — roughly 300-400 physician suicides per year in the U.S.
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Discover the Stories Medicine Never Says Out Loud
Physicians' Untold Stories by Scott J. Kolbaba, MD — 4.5 stars from 1018 readers.
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