MetaChat - Amnesia

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16 August 2007

Amnesia -- how quickly does an unclaimed amnesia victim get shuffled off to the local shelter or family services or wherever they might send them?→[More:] And where might they send them if they didn't have any other problems in their functionality?
Let's say it's anything from fugue states to whatever would prevent identifying recall.

post by: ethylene at: 08:29 | 13 comments

When it happens to Mark Trail (and it happens to him a lot), Kelly Welly usually spirits him away, convinces him that she's his wife, and just at the point of no return, Andy the cockblocking St. Bernard dog saves the day and leads him home to live in impotent sin with Cherry, Doc, and Rusty, until the next sideburned ne'er-do-well coshes him over the head with a freshly split firelog and he wanders senseless out of Lost Forest and back into Kelly's arms.

posted by Hugh Janus 16 August | 08:59

Let's say Andy the cockblocker gets distracted by the sausagefest down the street and Kelly Welly's spiritwagon has a flat: two weeks to a month before they kick the victim on their concrete-bound keester depending on how rich and vacant the hospital is and how attractive the victim despite the lack of resolution in their situation?

posted by ethylene 16 August | 09:09

I can't remember.

posted by chewatadistance 16 August | 09:12

It's so locally dependent that i don't think there is a definitive answer.
Time to put on my sleuthing boots and inquisitve tone.

posted by ethylene 16 August | 09:15

I think I've read that the kind of 'amnesia' found in movies, comic books, and TV shows hardly ever happens to anyone in real life for any serious length of time.

posted by Miko 16 August | 09:36

Yeah, i wasn't talking about fictional amnesia.
i was about to type something about common resolution times, but it's not a very common thing, but that doesn't mean there aren't stats.
i don't feel like slinging the lingo right now.
i'm just going to do "research", but still, i figure someone might come up with something good, like whatever happened to that one pianist guy who washed up in the uk somewhere...

posted by ethylene 16 August | 09:42

I don't remember. . .

posted by danf 16 August | 10:10

Probably depends on how interesting and manageable the patient is. How long did they keep that mysterious piano-playing guy a while back?

In Fredrick Wiseman's documentary Intensive Care, they were pulling the plug on everyone, but they held off on this one old guy because he kept talking about Beethoven sonatas.

posted by StickyCarpet 16 August | 10:27

However, newspaper reports now suggest he was only able to play one note continuously.

posted by StickyCarpet 16 August | 10:36

Thanks for not making a Gonzales joke.
i thought of him, too, but as it involves the NHS, which is a whole other kettle of fish i have to ask someone there about, which i might should it come to that. Thanks for trying.
i recede any responsibility for this thread as i have found my expected avenues of information, but where i cannot recall.

Commence with the dim recollections and pseudosciences involving bonks to the head, Mister Flinstone!

posted by ethylene 16 August | 10:48

how quickly does an unclaimed amnesia victim get shuffled off to the local shelter or family services or wherever they might send them? And where might they send them if they didn't have any other problems in their functionality?

Some stay indefinitely in the hospital while doctors try to bring them out of their state or find family or friends to hand them off to. Others are found in homeless shelters after years, having never been taken to the hospital. I've read news stories of amnesia victims who had been committed to a psych inpatient facility for years, and others who were tossed onto the street after a few weeks, so it's all up to luck, really.

posted by cmonkey 16 August | 11:22

StickyCarpet, do you mean Andreas Grassl? His father said that he was not professionally trained, but the guy definitely can play the piano.

posted by Specklet 16 August | 12:03

Yeah, funny how there where conflicting stories about how he could or could not or to what degree he could play.

They should have posted an mp3.

posted by StickyCarpet 16 August | 12:45

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