Chapter 7 Summary and Analysis

By the end of the second week at Magee, Alan was walking with a cane. The HMO felt that milestone was sufficient to stop benefits for Magee, and Alan ended up staying three weeks, instead of three months, at Magee because of denial of benefits. Cathy railed at the HMO for failing to recognize cognitive impairment while looking only at physical impairment when deciding benefits.

To illustrate Alan's sometimes difficult-to-detect cognitive impairments, Cathy talked about an incident five months after the accident in which Alan and Cathy attended the Philadelphia Flower Show. Cathy and Alan were avid gardeners and flower fans, and always attended this show. However, Alan could not recall any words for the flowers - daffodils, geraniums, foxglove. Alan had lost this particular category of vocabulary words in his accident.

Alan also suffered from topographical difficulties; that is, he...