Spontaneous healing, incantations, magical rituals: why medicine should take a quick look at the Hogwarts universe.
It is a plea for talking medicine, for better or for worse. How else would one understand the results that Vincent Gärtner from the Hauner Children’s Hospital in Munich and colleagues from the Medical Journal of Australia published? The researchers evaluated 1,541 illnesses, injuries and deaths that occurred in the Harry Potter universe. Although Lord Voldemort’s multiple mortality was factored out, morbidity and mortality in and around the Hogwarts wizarding boarding school were surprisingly high.
A number of incidents were due to duels, falls from broomsticks or poisoning, curses and spells caused suffering. The latter is further evidence of what white-coated medical mages can do to the Muggle world when they babble on and unsettle people. To say to the perfectly healthy bon vivant: “You are a risk patient!”; or to the pregnant woman: “Oh, the head is a bit big!” – because the ultrasound head is positioned askew. Those would be sentences.
Blockbusters like the “Peed Up Potion” should be further explored
At the same time, the retrospective study shows how important trust in one’s own body and in the treating magician are for recovery. Spontaneous healing mostly occurred in magic students, witches and elves. Hospital stays lasted less than a week in 99 percent of cases, underscoring the value of strengthening the outpatient sector.
If the ailments didn’t go away on their own, magical rituals and incantations helped; a clear indication of the healing effect of speaking medicine. Doctors should also be encouraged to trust the power of a successful staging and to celebrate their art – “Drama, Baby” – more effectively. Even with limited verbal skills, they should rely on doctor-patient communication instead of staring at the screen during consultation hours.
Hardly any original recipes have been handed down, but the Harry Potter world even has lessons for the pharmaceutical industry. Instead of getting bogged down, blockbusters like the “Pepper-Up Potion” should be further researched and offered as cheap generics. A number of other medications, on the other hand, are superfluous. Muggle medicine can learn a lot from the magical world – like finally learning to tell the important from the unimportant.