Gesundheit!

In authenticity is our modern form of plague: it kills life. At time when the power of technology makes possible undreamed- of interventions in the diseases of mankind, the very relationship between doctor and patients has become a battleground. Meet Hunter D. "Patch" Adams, M. D. , the Clown. A social revolutionary and the one-man show who believes in 'horse and buggy" medicine and never charges his patients, his medical career has been devoted to giving away health care one of the most expensive things in America for free. In 1971, Adams and a few colleagues founded the Gesundheit Institute, a forty-bed free hospital on 310 acres in a medically under-served area in northern West Virginia, utilizing an "unorthodox" approach to medicine: laughter, humor, the philosophy of listening, not just hearing, and doctor and patient as intimate, respecting partners. During the next twelve years they operated a home-base family medical practice, open to "anyone from anywhere" treating more than 15, 000 people without payment, malpractice insurance, or formal facilities.