A Quiet Revolution in Medicine: Physician Stories From Chicago

Illinois stands as one of the most important states in American medical history. Rush Medical College, founded in Chicago in 1843, was one of the first medical schools in the Midwest, and Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine (1859) produced generations of leading physicians. The University of Chicago, under Dr. Charles Huggins, won the Nobel Prize in 1966 for his work on hormonal treatment of prostate cancer. Cook County Hospital, established in 1866, pioneered the nation's first blood bank in 1937 under Dr. Bernard Fantus and served as the model for the television show ER.

Chicago was also where Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performed one of the first successful open-heart surgeries in 1893 at Provident Hospital, which he founded to train African American physicians and nurses. The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (now the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab) became the nation's top-ranked rehabilitation hospital. Loyola University Medical Center and the University of Illinois Hospital rounded out Chicago's extraordinary concentration of medical institutions. Downstate, the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in Springfield addressed the rural physician shortage, and the Mayo Clinic-trained physicians who practice throughout the state, including Dr. Scott Kolbaba at Northwestern Medicine, represent Illinois's deep connection to the highest standards of American internal medicine.

Illinois is among the most haunted states in America, with ghost stories spanning from Chicago's bustling streets to the quiet prairies downstate. Resurrection Mary, the ghost of a young woman who appears to motorists on Archer Avenue near Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, is one of the most famous vanishing hitchhiker legends in the world; multiple witnesses have reported picking up a blonde woman in a white dress who vanishes from their car as they pass the cemetery gates. Bachelor's Grove Cemetery in the Rubio Woods forest preserve near Midlothian has been called the most haunted cemetery in America, with documented sightings of a phantom farmhouse, a woman holding an infant, and a ghostly farmer with a plow horse.

The Bartonville State Hospital (Peoria State Hospital), which operated from 1902 to 1973, is famous for the legend of 'Old Book,' a patient named A. Bookbinder who was a fixture at the hospital's funerals—when he died, his apparition was reportedly seen mourning at his own funeral service, witnessed by hospital staff. In Cairo, Illinois, at the southern tip of the state, the ghost of a Civil War soldier haunts the Magnolia Manor. The Congress Plaza Hotel in Chicago's Loop has Room 441, which has been permanently sealed due to persistent reports of violent paranormal activity.

Chicago's paranormal history is extensive and deeply rooted. The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 left thousands dead, and ghost sightings in the rebuilt city have been reported ever since. The Eastland disaster of 1915, in which 844 people drowned when a ship capsized in the Chicago River, created one of the city's most active haunting sites—workers in the buildings along the river report ghostly figures and sounds. H.H. Holmes's 'Murder Castle,' built for the 1893 World's Fair, was said to be haunted long after his execution. Archer Avenue on the city's South Side is considered one of the most haunted roads in America, running past Resurrection Cemetery and other sites of reported paranormal activity. Chicago's rich tradition of ghost tours reflects the city's deep connection to its spectral past.

Chicago's medical history is marked by groundbreaking innovations born from necessity. The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 catalyzed the rebuilding of the city's medical infrastructure. Cook County Hospital established the nation's first blood bank in 1937, a breakthrough by Dr. Bernard Fantus that transformed emergency medicine worldwide. The city was also where Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performed one of the first successful open-heart surgeries in 1893 at Provident Hospital, which he founded as the first non-segregated hospital in the United States. Chicago's medical schools—Rush, Northwestern, and the University of Chicago—have produced numerous Nobel laureates in medicine and physiology.

The United States has one of the world's richest ghost story traditions, rooted in a blend of Native American spirit beliefs, European colonial folklore, and African American spiritual practices. From the headless horseman of Sleepy Hollow — immortalized by Washington Irving in 1820 — to the restless spirits of Civil War battlefields at Gettysburg, American ghost lore reflects the nation's turbulent history.

New Orleans stands as the undisputed spiritual capital of American ghost culture, where West African Vodou merged with French Catholic mysticism to create a tradition where the boundary between living and dead remains permanently thin. The city's above-ground cemeteries, known as 'Cities of the Dead,' are among the most visited supernatural sites in the world. Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans, is said to still grant wishes to those who mark three X's on her tomb.

Appalachian ghost traditions draw from Scots-Irish folklore, with tales of 'haints' — restless spirits trapped between worlds. In the Southwest, Native American traditions speak of skinwalkers and spirit animals, while Hawaiian culture reveres the Night Marchers — ghostly processions of ancient warriors whose torches can still be seen along sacred paths.

The United States is the global center of near-death experience research. Dr. Raymond Moody coined the term 'near-death experience' in his 1975 book 'Life After Life,' sparking decades of scientific inquiry. The University of Virginia's Division of Perceptual Studies, founded by Dr. Ian Stevenson, has documented over 2,500 cases of children reporting past-life memories.

Dr. Sam Parnia at NYU Langone Health led the landmark AWARE-II study, published in 2023, which found that 39% of cardiac arrest survivors had awareness during clinical death, with brain activity detected up to 60 minutes into CPR. Dr. Bruce Greyson at the University of Virginia developed the Greyson NDE Scale in 1983, still the gold standard for measuring NDE depth. An estimated 15 million Americans — roughly 1 in 20 adults — have reported a near-death experience.

The United States has documented numerous cases of unexplained medical recoveries. In Dr. Kolbaba's own book, a physician describes a patient declared brain-dead who suddenly recovered after family prayer. The Lourdes Medical Bureau has certified one American miracle cure. Cases of spontaneous remission from terminal cancer have been documented at institutions including MD Anderson Cancer Center and Memorial Sloan Kettering. The National Library of Medicine contains over 1,000 published case reports of 'spontaneous remission' across various cancers and autoimmune diseases — recoveries that defy current medical explanation.

Polish Catholic communities near Chicago, Illinois 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 Chicago, Illinois—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.

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 Chicago, Illinois. 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 Chicago, Illinois 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.

Community hospitals near Chicago, Illinois 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 Chicago, Illinois 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.

The intersection of miraculous recovery and medical documentation presents unique challenges. When a physician in Chicago encounters a case that defies explanation, the medical record must still be completed. How do you chart a tumor that disappeared overnight? How do you code a diagnosis of 'spontaneous complete remission of end-stage disease, mechanism unknown'? Dr. Kolbaba found that physicians often document these cases using cautious, clinical language that obscures the extraordinary nature of what occurred — noting 'unexpected clinical improvement' or 'resolution of findings not attributable to treatment' rather than acknowledging that what happened was, by any honest assessment, a miracle.

This documentation gap means that the true incidence of miraculous recovery is almost certainly higher than published estimates suggest. Cases that are not reported, not coded, and not published simply disappear from the medical literature — leaving the impression that miraculous recoveries are rarer than they actually are.

The story of multiple sclerosis in medical literature is, with very rare exceptions, a story of progressive decline. Patients may experience remissions and exacerbations, but the overall trajectory of the disease — particularly in the progressive forms — is one of increasing disability. The brain lesions that characterize MS are generally considered irreversible; lost myelin does not regenerate, and damaged neurons do not repair themselves.

Yet Barbara Cummiskey's case, as documented in "Physicians' Untold Stories," contradicts this understanding entirely. Not only did her symptoms resolve completely, but her brain lesions — visible on MRI, documented by multiple neurologists — vanished. For neurologists in Chicago, Illinois, this case represents not just a medical mystery but a direct challenge to fundamental assumptions about neurological disease. If one patient's brain can reverse this kind of damage, what does that imply about the brain's potential for healing in general?

Chicago's immigrant communities, who often navigate healthcare systems while maintaining healing traditions from their countries of origin, find particular resonance in "Physicians' Untold Stories." Many immigrant families bring with them experiences of healing that do not fit neatly into Western medical categories — recoveries attributed to prayer, traditional medicine, family rituals, or spiritual practices. Dr. Kolbaba's book validates these experiences by demonstrating that even within Western medicine, healing sometimes defies conventional explanation. For immigrant families in Chicago, Illinois, the book bridges the gap between their cultural healing traditions and the American medical system, affirming that both have something valuable to teach us about the nature of recovery.

The healthcare professionals of Chicago know that healing is never purely mechanical. Behind every treatment plan, every surgery, every round of medication is a human being whose recovery depends on factors that no algorithm can fully capture — their will to live, the support of their families, their faith, their hope. "Physicians' Untold Stories" by Dr. Scott Kolbaba celebrates these intangible factors by documenting cases where they appeared to make the decisive difference. For the people of Chicago, Illinois, the book validates what many have always sensed: that the best medicine is practiced not just with skill but with humility, and that healing sometimes follows paths that no physician can predict.