“To the Doctors Antonella Cacchione, Angela Mastronuzzi and Gessica Della Bella, to Doctor Carlo Efisio Marras, to Orlandina and to all the healthcare personnel of the Pediatric Oncohematology and Neuro Rehabilitation of the Bambino Gesù departments of Rome and Palidoro, for having saved me from the depths and having indicated me the road. To my roommates, to Saverio, Giovanni, Ismaele, Soave and Ivan, sparks in that darkness. I hope that your life has now exceeded your expectations.
This path is dedicated to you”. These are the two dedications that open the degree thesis of Luigi Tramonte, 29 years old and former patient of the Bambino Gesù for a cerebellum tumor that affected him when he was 15 years old. A traumatic experience that left him guided in the choice to become a doctor today and from which, he says, he learned a great lesson: “In difficult life paths such as illness, it is essential not to feel alone, to work as a team and to share”.
If before he felt “close to rock bottom”, now, with a degree in Medicine obtained yesterday from La Sapienza University of Rome, Luigi looks to the future with the dream of becoming a family doctor. “For my specialization I chose General Medicine because as a doctor I would like to build a bond of trust with patients, particularly adolescents”, he says. A life choice that distanced him from his love for literature, a passion that he however plans to rediscover. Luigi’s story began in September 2010, when he was 15 years old and he lived in Massafra in Puglia, where he attended scientific high school. The warning signs of what would later turn out to be a tumor in the cerebellum were not immediately understood. “The most frequent symptoms, which at the time no one could understand what they were due to, were dizziness, headache, vomiting and tinnitus.
What brought me to the emergency room was the hemiparesis of the entire left side”, he says. So it was that, from Puglia, Luigi went to have an MRI first at the Besta in Milan, where, however, there was no availability, and then at the Bambin Jesus of Rome. “Before going to the Palidoro office, I spent about two weeks at the Bambino Gesù al Gianicolo office, where I underwent two operations. In the first time they removed the tumor, while the second time they intervened to drain the internal bleeding, a rather frequent complication.” “One thing I remember in particular was the feeling of happiness when the diagnosis finally arrived and they told me that they would operate on me. For me, that meant the end of all those symptoms that no one understood at the beginning and that I feared would accompany me for the rest of my life.”
“If there is a message that I want to send to patients today – he says – it is the fact that they are not alone. I experienced the feeling of loneliness in hospital. However, precisely because there you are in contact with other patients, there everyone feels like one big family and, in my case, we managed to work as a team.” A sense of community that helps a lot, even in small gestures, “like when Ismaele’s father, who was a cook, prepared lunch for me too”, she says.
Today, Luigi has overcome the darkest period of the disease but does not forget those moments and the people with whom he shared them. Without them, he says, “I wouldn’t be here.” This is why his thesis has their names in mind: “The doctors who treated me, because without them, without their closeness and support, that spark that pushed me to choose to wear the white coat would never have been sparked in me. They were my inspiration. And then my companions in the hospital, because without sharing that experience I would not have made this life choice once again.” “I won’t be an oncologist – concludes Luigi – because it would be too painful for me, a constant reminder. But I will be a family doctor, to stay in contact with as many people as possible, guaranteeing that empathy and closeness that are fundamental for patients, the same ones that ‘my’ doctors have always given me.”
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