End ALS!!

I have reviewed the Ted Talk by Hiro Fujita and his friends, who discussed Hiro's life before and after his amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) diagnosis. Before his diagnosis, Hiro was "Mr. Excitement," going out on the town, making spontaneous trips, and achieving his career goals in advertisement. He eventually became the youngest advertising strategy planner in Japan, when suddenly he began to feel tingling in his fingers and fatigue, which at the time he attributed to being hung over or from staying out too late, but as his symptoms persisted he sought medical treatment and was diagnosed with ALS. 

Over time he lost control of his hands, leaving him with difficulty eating with chopsticks, writing, and typing. Then, he lost control of his lower limb movement, which led to falls where he was unable to get up for hours until someone arrived that could help him. He describes this experience as watching his own body waste away as he was sitting inside of it. Finally, in an attempt to prolong Hiro's life, he was offered a tracheotomy and a gastronomy tube. Hiro was faced with the decision to live longer with the pain of ALS and the inability to talk and eat on his own or live a shorter life with the pain of saying goodbye to his loved ones. He made the decision to continue living life with ALS in the hopes that he contribute to the lives of his family, friends, and community. After this decision, Hiro found his voice, advocating for his mission to increase funds allocated toward ALS research, change the participant requirements for ALS research to be more voluntary toward those suffering from ALS, tell his story, and through all his work end ALS. 

This Ted talk relates to our course in that it describes the effects of ALS on Hiro Fujita's life in both positive and challenging ways, which changed his roles, occupations, and the trajectory of his life. Hiro's story is a real-life example of how developing a life-changing condition can change your life for the better through reflection, acceptance, and determination. I think that it is important that we learn to teach our clients to advocate for themselves and their cause, whether that be their own health, how their family and community teats them after the development of the condition, or the health and treatment of others. Through advocacy, our clients can find connections with people in the community, educate others on their condition, and bring change to how money is allocated, clinical studies are conducted, and how diagnosis, treatment, and therapy are conducted. I hope that by hearing stories like Hiro's, students and other individuals will be able to see others who have conditions and disabilities, that may make them different from what is considered typical, as people who still have the same wants and needs as everyone else and treat them accordingly. 

References

TEDx Talks. (2014). END ALS: Hiro Fujita at TEDxTokyo 2014. In YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIBmKX4UnaE

‌