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Lorenzo's Oil Essay

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Lorenzo’s Oil In 1984, Lorenzo Michael Murphy Odone, just a young boy at the age of 5, was diagnosed with adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD). ALD is an extremely rare genetic disorder that causes damage to the myelin sheath, which is the protective layer that surrounds the central nervous system’s nerve fibers. This demyelination prevents and impairs the conduction of signals to and from the brain, causing many problems such as aggression, visual loss, learning disabilities, dysphagia, and hearing loss (Kugler). Lorenzo’s Oil, a remarkable movie that is based on actual events, is about Lorenzo and his parent’s fight against ALD. During this time era, there was little research about ALD and doctors were not particularly eager to intervene with a treatment that had no guarantee of working. After viewing …show more content…

Plot/Characters Lorenzo’s Oil, produced in 1992, is based on the real-life story of the Odone family. In the beginning of the movie, Lorenzo and his parents, Augusto and Michaela, are living in the Comoro Islands, Africa, while Augusto is working for the World Bank. Augusto is to be transferred to the United States to work, which means that the family must leave Africa. After only being back in the United States for 2 months, Lorenzo begins to experience neurological problems such as extreme aggression, hearing loss, and paraplegia. After running several medical tests, doctors diagnose Lorenzo with ALD. Only ten years earlier, ALD was not even a discovered disease, which meant that doctors were still trying to fully understand it. Lorenzo is given only two years to survive, due to a lack of treatment or cure. Doctors said that there is absolutely nothing they can do for Lorenzo. Augusto and Michaela are extremely devastated and decide to take matters into their

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