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inthysite -> RE: McCain's Health Concerns (8/4/2008 9:44:34 PM)
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This is a little long but hey, you asked. Listed are presidents with cancer, tumors, and other serious illnesses.
George Washington
1789 - 1797
Our first president almost died of pneumonia in 1790, his second year in office. He was so ill that secretary of State Thomas Jefferson wrote to a friend, "We have been very near losing the President". Though his doctors thought he would die, Washington did recover and completed two terms in office.
Andrew Jackson
1829 - 1837
When he was inaugurated as our seventh president, the 62 year-old, rail-thin Andrew Jackson was described by one observer as "a tottering scarecrow in deadly agony." The new president was in pain emotionally as well as physically. Not only had he just lost his wife to a heart attack, but he was also suffering from rotting teeth, chronic headaches, failing eyesight, and constant pain and internal bleeding from two bullets lodged in his body.
William Henry Harrison
4 March - 4 April 1841
One of only two Whig party candidates elected to the presidency, William Henry Harrison was, at age 68 the oldest person to reach that office until Ronald Reagan was elected almost a century and a half later.
Due to his age, Harrison faced election rumors that he was unwell. To discredit these rumors, Harrison waged a very active campaign that left him exhausted. Although the day of his inauguration was bitterly cold, the new president wore neither an overcoat nor a hat. His inaugural address lasted almost two hours. He developed a severe chest cold, from which he never fully recovered.
Two weeks after his inauguration, Harrison, weakened from a lingering chest cold, took an early morning walk and got caught in a rainstorm. The new president developed pneumonia. Harrison's physician bled and purged him, but to no avail. Harrison died on 4 April, one month after taking office.
Zachary Taylor
1849 - 1850
General Zachary Taylor was 64 years old when he became the 12th President of the United States. He was given the nickname "Old Rough and Ready" by his fellow soldiers.
In August 1849, during a trip through the northeastern United States, Taylor was bedridden with a violent attack of diarrhea and high fever. His personal physician feared that the President would not recover. "Old Rough and Ready" did and returned to Washington. A year later, Taylor faced a similar attack, but this time it proved fatal.
Early Presidents and Their Illnesses
Franklin Pierce
1853·1857
Both Pierce and his wife had tuberculosis of the lungs and hemoptysis
Abraham Lincoln
1861·1865
Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2b (MEN2B) is a genetic cancer syndrome. Its most common cancers occur in two endocrine glands: the thyroid (medullary carcinoma of the thyroid) and the adrenal (pheochromocytoma).
Did Lincoln have cancer? If he had MEN2B, the answer is certain: yes. The historical record also suggests he had cancer.
Lincoln began losing weight in 1860. There is no quantitative data about his weight after becoming President, but many people wrote of his declining appearance and increasing thinness. Casts of his face in 1860 and 1865 show a striking loss of soft tissue. Temporal wasting is present on the 1865 cast.
In his last months, Lincoln had headaches, cold feet & hands, exercise intolerance & sweating, pervasive fatigue that a work respite did not ease, fainting, and nausea. These findings are compatible with a pheochromocytoma [33s].
MEN 2B is rare -- perhaps about one in a million people have it -- and there are no large studies on survival statistics. Lincoln lived to be quite old for someone with MEN2B.
Chester Arthur
1881·1885
Arthur was fatigued, irritable, and physically ill during 1882. There are reports that the Surgeon General examined Arthur in October (i.e. about a year after becoming President) and diagnosed the kidney affliction known as "Bright's disease" [1a]. (Bright's disease is no longer a recognized concept in medicine, because it lumped too many different kidney disorders into one "disease." Thus, the exact nature of Arthur's ailment is unknown. But because Bright's disease was considered uniformly fatal, Arthur knew he had a death sentence.)
Grover Cleveland
1885·1889 & 1893·1897
On June 13, 1893, Cleveland noticed a "rough place" on the roof of his mouth. It was diagnosed as cancer, precipitating one of the most celebrated incidents in the history of Presidential medicine.
Ultimately, on July 1, the President underwent a risky operation aboard his yacht. At his insistence, his illness and surgery were kept secret from the public, the press, the Cabinet, and (one presumes) the Vice President. A second, less risky operation was performed aboard the yacht on July 17.
Afterwards, direct questions about the President's health were answered falsely. "Cleveland is alleged to have said that he had done more lying in the period just before his surgery and the period immediately thereafter than he had ever done in the remainder of his life" [3d]. It was 25 years before the secret was compromised.
Woodrow Wilson
1915·1921
Dr. E. A. Weinstein has carefully analyzed Wilson's medical history in a book [14]. He finds evidence of multiple strokes.
Wilson's first stroke was in May 1896. It caused marked weakness of the right upper limb plus sensory disturbances in the fingers. The finger problems were mis-diagnosed as neuritis. Wilson was unable to write normally for almost a year afterwards. Comment: There may be some dispute about this event, in a later article in the New England Journal of Medicine.
NeurologyAtherosclerosis
stroke #2 In June 1904 Wilson developed weakness in the right upper limb that lasted for several months [14].
NeurologyEyeAtherosclerosis
stroke #3 On May 28, 1906, Wilson suddenly lost vision in his left eye. This persisted. Weakness of the right upper limb was present [14].
Ronald Reagan
1981·1989.
A 1984 proctoscopic examination disclosed a small polyp in Reagan's colon. Biopsy showed it was benign. In March 1985, another polyp was found, as were trace amounts of blood in his stool. A change in Reagan's diet eliminated the blood. He underwent endoscopic removal of the polyp and colonoscopy on July 12, 1985, at Bethesda Naval Medical Center. Colonoscopy disclosed a second, more dangerous tumor -- a villous adenoma -- that could only be removed by surgery.
George Bush
1989·1993
Graves disease was diagnosed immediately after the occurrence of atrial fibrillation. Bush had been feeling increasingly tired over the preceding two weeks, had lost nine pounds in two months, and had seen his handwriting deteriorate. Physical examination disclosed a fine tremor of his hands and slight enlargement of his thyroid gland (goiter).
Bush's wife, Barabara, had earlier been diagnosed with Graves disease. The odds of two people (not related by blood) developing Graves disease within a two years of each other are long (Doctor Zebra has seen a one-in-three-million number [9], but thinks this answers the wrong question.)
The Bush dog, Millie, came down with Graves disease, too [4], although there are reports Millie had a different auto-immune disease: lupus [9].
Because of the remarkable coincidence of three cases of auto-immune disease in one household, the Secret Service tested the water in the White House, at Camp David, at the Vice President's residence, and at Walker's Point (Bush's home in Maine) for lithium and iodine, two substances "known to cause thyroid problems" [11j]
William Clinton
1993·2001
On Sept. 2, 2004, Clinton was evaluated at Northern Westchester Hospital in New York for chest pain and shortness of breath. Results were normal, and Clinton went home. The next day, further evaluation at the Westchester Medical Center (probably a cardiac angiogram) led to the recommendation for urgent four-vessel coronary bypass grafting
Medical History of the Presidents of the United States
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