He made television history across 256 episodes of M*A*S*H and became the face of several philanthropic movements. But there was a time when Alan Alda experienced a health scare far from home, but when the situation seemed most intimidating, he was able to use the medical knowledge he gained on M*A*S*H to break the tension for everyone.
From 1972 to 1983, Alda starred in CBS’s M*A*S*H as Benjamin Franklin “Hawkeye” Pierce. Amidst other projects, Alda also hosted Scientific American Frontiers, which at one point brought him overseas to Chile. It was there that Alda required a surgical procedure the likes of which he could actually talk about with the surgeon.
Alan Alda used his medical ‘M*A*S*H’ knowledge to impress doctors and ease the tension of surgery
From 1993 to 2005, Alda hosted Scientific American Frontiers. In his memoir, Never Have Your Dog Stuffed: And Other Things I’ve Learned, Alda recalled a time when he experienced intense stomach pain for a prolonged period of time.
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Alda was brought to a local hospital and told that to stop the pain, he would need surgery. Medical personnel explained the procedure and Alda was struck by a sense of deja vu.
“Oh,” Alda recalled saying, “You’re going to do an end-to-end anastomosis.” Visible shocked, the doctor confirmed that Alda was entirely correct, adding, “How do you know that?”
Alda explained, “I did many of them on M*A*S*H.” The atmosphere changed in a blink.
Bridging a communication gap has always been important to Alda
In his memoir, the actor elaborated, “It’s true. I did them on extras and day players alike. And although all I operated on was a piece of foam rubber, I could picture exactly what I was supposed to be doing.”
Of the occasion, Alda’s memoir reveals, “There was a short pause, and then he laughed. Through my haze, I smiled. My real illness, it seems, is my compulsion to amuse. Apparently, you can offer to disembowel me, but I’ll still see if I can make you laugh.”
Throughout his career, Alda has been dedicated to using his platform to help make communicating scientific concepts to individuals outside of the field as accessible and comprehensive as possible. That is why the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science is dedicated to teaching scientists how to share transparent, helpful, and understandable scientific concepts for all to understand. Science, the center emphasizes, influences every aspect of life, “Yet for too many people, its significance gets lost in jargon and technical details, disconnected from their lives and experiences.”
The cross-disciplinary organization was founded in 2009 as part of Stony Brook University’s School of Communication and Journalism and aims to train scientists to distill their information in an accessible manner.