Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Michael Thompson, MD

2021; Volume: 49; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5298/1081-5937-49.3.03

2158-348X

Lynda Thompson,

Ophthalmology and Visual Health Research

Where does one begin, trying to sum up a creative force like Michael Thompson? He lived a purpose-driven life—so much drive and determination, focused on helping others be their best. Those others could be friends, colleagues, his own offspring, students, patients, or clients.It could also be his wife. Anyone who saw us lecture together will recall that (a) women talk more, and (b) Michael knew how to interject when something needed clarification or expansion and, most of all, he could wake up the audience. His voice is still so often in my head, guiding me. One of his last bits of advice, given when he realized he was not going to be around for the third and final segment of a functional neuroanatomy webinar given in February 2021 (jointly sponsored by the Brazilian group, Neuronus, and the Biofeedback Federation of Europe, with simultaneous translation in Portuguese and Spanish, hence a serious obligation) was, “Make them curious.” As a teacher, his preference was to pose questions, rather than dryly sharing facts. He believed in everyone's ability, be it an 18-month-old grandchild or a senior citizen recovering from stroke, to be an active learner and to enjoy the process. And he enjoyed it, too, always learning when he interacted with others. Michael was a past master in Socratic questioning, whether teaching sailing and canoeing—two of his passions—or teaching abstruse concepts concerning heart–brain connections. He would sit next to a 6-year-old, as they examined brainwaves together, with the same eagerness and intensity as when sitting next to Barry Sterman or Jay Gunkelman as they reviewed an electroencephalogram (EEG).And, speaking of Barry, how Michael loved his biofeedback (BFB) colleagues and appreciated learning from them! Joel Lubar was his first neurofeedback (NFB) teacher. Frank Diets, builder of the F-1000 equipment that did feedback for EEG, temperature and electrodermal, was one of his heroes. With Frank he once did a demo (was it at one of Rob Kall's Winter Brain meetings?) in which Michael called out a frequency, “Make 17 Hz, please.” Frank, whose EEG spectral array was being projected on the screen, would raise that frequency. Wow! What an impressive refinement on Joe Kamiya's university students being able to identify when they were producing alpha. Frank's wife, Mary Diets, who had worked with BFB at Canyon Ranch, was inspiration for always combining NFB and BFB.Michael was comfortable with BFB because he had been part of an innovative Department of Psychiatry at the University of Western Ontario (UWO). They started a BFB unit at the new hospital in town. Being residency training director at UWO led to writing his first book, A Resident's Guide to Psychiatric Education (1979). In compiling the book, and foreshadowing his future international teaching, he got the top academic psychiatrists in the United States, Canada, England, Australia, and New Zealand to collaborate on the tome. In addition to being director of education in the University's psychiatry department, he was the medical director and chief of staff at London Psychiatric Hospital, an 800-bed asylum that, in the early ‘70s, was starting the transition to community care. While modernizing treatment, he also let the long-time residents continue to tend their large vegetable garden, even when the Ministry of Health mandated that there was a cost savings in buying potatoes, rather than having psychiatric patients growing them.Given that background, Michael was always a proponent of combining approaches, not only NFB plus BFB, but also looking at clients' functioning from a biopsychosocial perspective. Clients at the ADD Centre get a handout with advice regarding what bodes well for successful outcomes when doing NFB + BFB training. It has suggestions for breathing, online computer exercises, diet, exercise, and sleep (BODES).Whether in a small handout like BODES or his opus magnum, The Neurofeedback Book (800+ pages and weight of 10 pounds), Michael wrote only after meticulous research. He reviewed thousands of papers when writing that basic text. He would read (and give me executive summaries) to be productive during the two-hour drive to our cottage. Once on our island, he interspersed outdoor activities (always a morning swim, always a Sunday paddle to church, sailing and canoeing always preferred to the motor boat as means of transport) with sitting on the porch with a stack of articles beside him and his computer on the wide arm of his Muskoka chair.The only thing more important than learning and sharing that knowledge (by writing or by preparing workshops and lectures) was time with children and grandchildren. And what a legacy is his family…elder daughter, Laura, is a painter in Florence. Michael started painting under her tutelage three years ago and, no surprise, he was a natural. Younger daughter, Kate, is an emergency medicine physician, living in British Columbia and doing ski patrol as well as medicine and, of course, teaching at the University of British Columbia. (Her other love is sailing, and she was a Canadian junior champion who represented Canada at the Youth Worlds, in the 470 class. Michael taught her to sail at age 5 by falling out of the boat so she would have to take control and come round to pick him up. Yes, innovative and spontaneous teaching techniques!)Choosing to live in a ski town happens when your dad gets you on the slopes at age 3, despite him having a progressive muscular atrophy (Charcot-Marie-Tooth) that meant he had to creatively compensate. Michael's last skiing in Whistler, British Columbia, in 2019 (the pandemic cancelled the 2020 trip), was on a SitSki: you don't bemoan your lack of mobility; you adapt and have fun with it, too. In a similar vein, rather than curtailing international adventures as walking became more challenging, he got a TravelScoot designed for airline travel. Of course, he had been an early adopter regarding computers and bought the first laptop produced by IBM, which came out as he was finding it increasingly difficult to write with a pen. He always turned a challenge into an opportunity.And what of our sons? The younger, Aaron, became a physician, then added an MPH from Harvard. With occupational medicine as his specialty, he is passionate about improving workers' health being tied to social justice. Of course, he wears many hats: two jobs related to improving medical care covered by workers' insurance, in addition to teaching (residency training director at University of Toronto) and running a hospital clinic. His older brother became a Level III ski coach and helped coach the Penn State ski team while working toward his PhD. His thesis developed new metrics for assessing concussion in athletes. You guessed it—he included quantitative EEG (QEEG) and event-related potentials among the measures.Later, James cofounded Evoke Neuroscience with David Hagedorn, a psychologist and NFB innovator. Their goal was to streamline the laborious process of QEEG interpretation. They first met at a Biofeedback Certification International Alliance (BCIA)-certified neurofeedback fundamentals course at Stony Lake, Ontario. How Michael loved hosting those spring and fall workshops! Held at a lodge on the lake, an international group would get their immersion in brain science coupled with visits down the lake to our cottage. Canoeing, bird walks led by a local ornithologist, wine and cheese, plus great chats by the fire rounded out the learning.Inspired teaching encouraged inspired outcomes: Among Stony Lake BCIA-course alumni are the folks who subsequently developed the Korean database, the sport psychologist who started a Mind Room at AC Milan, a psychiatrist and Afghanistan veteran using NFB + BFB at a major military hospital, authors of books featuring applied neuroscience (Mindfull Parent by Elizabeth Noske and Brain Dance by Diane Grimald Wilson), and hundreds of practitioners from around the globe who do careful work because Michael's knowledge challenged their good brains and his enthusiasm touched their good hearts.There has been new learning for me since his death. Do you know, for example, about transactive memory? Let me share that relevant concept, which was new to me. Malcolm Gladwell (raised in Canada, by the by) summarized Daniel Wegner's observations on memory thus: “Little bits of ourselves reside in other people's minds.” In other words, we let someone we love remember things for us, because that knowledge can be easily called on when needed.A wife might remember people's names and anniversaries for her husband. In Michael's memory resided such things as how to operate a motorboat, build fires, and explain functional neuroanatomy in exquisite detail, so my memory could be lazy about those things. When your partner dies, however, everything you have stored in their brain becomes inaccessible. It will be tough, learning to paddle my own canoe. But Michael exemplified the motto, “You can't change the wind, but you can adjust the sails.” With him gone, it behooves the rest of us to honor his legacy. So, paddle on, continue learning, and continue sharing your knowledge in the service of others.And may Michael, now on new adventures beyond our horizons, have fair winds and following seas.