Franklin D. Roosevelt, later the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 to 1945, began experiencing symptoms of a paralytic illness in 1921 when he was 39 years old. His main symptoms were fevers; symmetric, ascending paralysis; facial paralysis; bowel and bladder dysfunction; numbness and hyperesthesia; and a descending pattern of recovery. He was diagnosed with poliomyelitis and underwent years of therapy, including hydrotherapy at Warm Springs, Georgia. Roosevelt remained paralyzed from the waist down and relied on a wheelchair and leg braces for mobility, which he took efforts to conceal in public. In 1938, he founded the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, leading to the development of polio vaccines. Although historical accounts continue to refer to Roosevelt's case as polio, the diagnosis has been questioned in the context of current medical science, with a competing diagnosis of Guillain–Barré syndrome proposed by some authors.
Illness and aftermath
On August 9, 1921, 39-year-old Franklin D. Roosevelt, at the time a practicing lawyer in New York City, joined his family at their vacation home at Campobello, a Canadian island off the coast of Maine. Among those at Campobello when Roosevelt arrived were his wife, Eleanor, their children, his political aide Louis Howe, Howe's wife, and their young son. On August 10, after a day of strenuous activity, Roosevelt came down with an illness characterized by fevers, ascending paralysis, facial paralysis, prolonged bowel and bladder dysfunction, and numbness and hypersensitivity of the skin. Roosevelt came close to death from the illness. He faced many life-threatening medical problems including the possibility of respiratory failure, urinary tract infection, injury to the urethra or bladder, decubitus ulcers, clots in the leg veins, and malnutrition. Eleanor's nursing care was responsible for Roosevelt's survival. Most of the symptoms resolved themselves, but he was left permanently paralyzed from the waist down.
Timeline of illness
Mid July: Roosevelt gave testimony to a Senate committee investigating a Navy scandal.
July 28: Roosevelt visited the Boy Scout Jamboree at Bear Mountain State Park.
August 5–8: Roosevelt traveled to Campobello with his friend and new employer, Van Lear Black, on Black's ocean-going yacht.
August 9 (Tuesday): Roosevelt fell into the cold waters of the Bay of Fundy. Later, he arrived at Campobello.
August 10: Roosevelt spent the day physically active. Afterward, he complained of chills, nausea, and pain in his lower back. He skipped dinner and went to bed. Chills lasted through the night.
August 11: In the morning, one of his legs felt weak. Roosevelt had a fever. Dr. Eben H. Bennet, a general practitioner in the nearby village of Lubec who had known the Roosevelts for years, visited Roosevelt and diagnosed a bad summer cold. By the evening, one leg was paralyzed, and the other had become weak.
August 12: Both legs were paralyzed. His temperature was 102 °F (39 °C). Pain shot through his legs, feet and back. Bennet suggested a consultation with Dr. William W. Keen, an eminent retired neurosurgeon vacationing nearby. Roosevelt's legs were numb. They then became painfully sensitive to touch, "so painful that he could not stand the pressure of the bedclothes, and even the movement of the breezes across his skin caused acute distress." He could not pass urine.
August 13: Roosevelt was paralyzed from the chest down. On that day and the following, his hands, arms, and shoulders were weak. He had difficulty moving his bowels and required enemas. Keen made what Eleanor described as "a most careful, thorough examination".
August 14: Roosevelt continued to be unable to pass urine for two weeks, and required catheterization. His fever continued for a total of six to seven days. Keen repeated his examination, a bending and prodding that Elliott later termed "excruciating" for his father. Keen diagnosed a clot of blood to the lower spinal cord, and prescribed massage of the leg muscles. Eleanor and Howe began massaging Roosevelt's legs as instructed by Keen, bringing on agonizing pain.
August 15: Prostrate and mildly sedated, Roosevelt was occasionally delirious.
August 19: Frederic Delano, Roosevelt's uncle, had received a letter from Louis Howe requesting to find a doctor to come see Roosevelt. Delano called his son-in-law, a physician, who recommended he speak to another physician, a Dr. Parker. Parker told Delano that the case sounded like infantile paralysis, and that the leading authorities on the disease were at the Harvard Infantile Paralysis Commission in Boston. Delano caught a train and arrived the next morning.