Download or read book Searching for the Best Medicine written by Arthur Bank and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2013 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book describes the life and times of a physician-scientist over the last half-century. Part One is about the author''s struggle with colon cancer and the lessons he learnt from the experience; Part Two is about his life growing up, the pretzel bakery, his family, being educated at Bronx Science, Columbia College, Harvard Medical School, and his medical training at the Boston City Hospital and the NIH. Part Three, the major portion of the book, describes the author''s experiences as a practicing physician and hematologist at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center over 40 years. It also presents his views on what it takes to be a good doctor and to practice good medicine. Part Four is about medicine today, the crisis in medical care and in obtaining affordable health insurance in the United States, and potential solutions to these problems. And finally, it also describes the author''s views on how changes in America over the past few decades have transformed our society from that of the meritocracy as known in the early days to that of the present society dominated by financial considerations.
Download or read book Searching For The Best Medicine The Life And Times Of A Doctor And Patient written by Arthur Bank and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2013-04-30 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book describes the life and times of a physician-scientist over the last half-century. Part One is about the author's struggle with colon cancer and the lessons he learnt from the experience; Part Two is about his life growing up, the pretzel bakery, his family, being educated at Bronx Science, Columbia College, Harvard Medical School, and his medical training at the Boston City Hospital and the NIH. Part Three, the major portion of the book, describes the author's experiences as a practicing physician and hematologist at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center over 40 years. It also presents his views on what it takes to be a good doctor and to practice good medicine. Part Four is about medicine today, the crisis in medical care and in obtaining affordable health insurance in the United States, and potential solutions to these problems. And finally, it also describes the author's views on how changes in America over the past few decades have transformed our society from that of the meritocracy as known in the early days to that of the present society dominated by financial considerations.
Download or read book Every Patient Tells a Story written by Lisa Sanders and published by Harmony. This book was released on 2010-09-21 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A riveting exploration of the most difficult and important part of what doctors do, by Yale School of Medicine physician Dr. Lisa Sanders, author of the monthly New York Times Magazine column "Diagnosis," the inspiration for the hit Fox TV series House, M.D. "The experience of being ill can be like waking up in a foreign country. Life, as you formerly knew it, is on hold while you travel through this other world as unknown as it is unexpected. When I see patients in the hospital or in my office who are suddenly, surprisingly ill, what they really want to know is, ‘What is wrong with me?’ They want a road map that will help them manage their new surroundings. The ability to give this unnerving and unfamiliar place a name, to know it—on some level—restores a measure of control, independent of whether or not that diagnosis comes attached to a cure. Because, even today, a diagnosis is frequently all a good doctor has to offer." A healthy young man suddenly loses his memory—making him unable to remember the events of each passing hour. Two patients diagnosed with Lyme disease improve after antibiotic treatment—only to have their symptoms mysteriously return. A young woman lies dying in the ICU—bleeding, jaundiced, incoherent—and none of her doctors know what is killing her. In Every Patient Tells a Story, Dr. Lisa Sanders takes us bedside to witness the process of solving these and other diagnostic dilemmas, providing a firsthand account of the expertise and intuition that lead a doctor to make the right diagnosis. Never in human history have doctors had the knowledge, the tools, and the skills that they have today to diagnose illness and disease. And yet mistakes are made, diagnoses missed, symptoms or tests misunderstood. In this high-tech world of modern medicine, Sanders shows us that knowledge, while essential, is not sufficient to unravel the complexities of illness. She presents an unflinching look inside the detective story that marks nearly every illness—the diagnosis—revealing the combination of uncertainty and intrigue that doctors face when confronting patients who are sick or dying. Through dramatic stories of patients with baffling symptoms, Sanders portrays the absolute necessity and surprising difficulties of getting the patient’s story, the challenges of the physical exam, the pitfalls of doctor-to-doctor communication, the vagaries of tests, and the near calamity of diagnostic errors. In Every Patient Tells a Story, Dr. Sanders chronicles the real-life drama of doctors solving these difficult medical mysteries that not only illustrate the art and science of diagnosis, but often save the patients’ lives.
Download or read book Doctor of the Heart written by Isadore Rosenfeld and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An autobiographical account of Dr. Isadore Rosenfeld-recounting his most memorable experiences as "America's Doctor" and Doctor to the Stars. Told with grace and humor, the many anecdotes in this book offer insight into what it is like to be a doctor during some of the most progressive eras of medicine. Doctor of the Heart is a unique and engaging portrait of this cardiologist's remarkable international medical career. Inspired at an early age to become a physician, Isadore Rosenfeld shares a lifetime of challenges, advances in patient care, and unique experiences that have enriched his life personally as well as professionally. This memoir captures an extraordinary career in medicine spanning more than sixty years and provides a compelling picture of a life dedicated to healing. Dr. Rosenfeld has authored more than a dozen books for the layperson, many of which were New York Times best-sellers. His weekly television broadcasts and contribution as Health Editor for Parade Magazine earned him beloved recognition as "America's Doctor."
Download or read book The Patient Will See You Now written by Eric Topol and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2016-10-25 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essential guide by one of America's leading doctors to how digital technology enables all of us to take charge of our health A trip to the doctor is almost a guarantee of misery. You'll make an appointment months in advance. You'll probably wait for several hours until you hear "the doctor will see you now"-but only for fifteen minutes! Then you'll wait even longer for lab tests, the results of which you'll likely never see, unless they indicate further (and more invasive) tests, most of which will probably prove unnecessary (much like physicals themselves). And your bill will be astronomical. In The Patient Will See You Now, Eric Topol, one of the nation's top physicians, shows why medicine does not have to be that way. Instead, you could use your smartphone to get rapid test results from one drop of blood, monitor your vital signs both day and night, and use an artificially intelligent algorithm to receive a diagnosis without having to see a doctor, all at a small fraction of the cost imposed by our modern healthcare system. The change is powered by what Topol calls medicine's "Gutenberg moment." Much as the printing press took learning out of the hands of a priestly class, the mobile internet is doing the same for medicine, giving us unprecedented control over our healthcare. With smartphones in hand, we are no longer beholden to an impersonal and paternalistic system in which "doctor knows best." Medicine has been digitized, Topol argues; now it will be democratized. Computers will replace physicians for many diagnostic tasks, citizen science will give rise to citizen medicine, and enormous data sets will give us new means to attack conditions that have long been incurable. Massive, open, online medicine, where diagnostics are done by Facebook-like comparisons of medical profiles, will enable real-time, real-world research on massive populations. There's no doubt the path forward will be complicated: the medical establishment will resist these changes, and digitized medicine inevitably raises serious issues surrounding privacy. Nevertheless, the result-better, cheaper, and more human health care-will be worth it. Provocative and engrossing, The Patient Will See You Now is essential reading for anyone who thinks they deserve better health care. That is, for all of us.
Download or read book When Doctors Become Patients written by Robert Klitzman and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For many doctors, their role as powerful healer precludes thoughts of ever getting sick themselves. When they do, it initiates a profound shift of awareness-- not only in their sense of their selves, which is invariably bound up with the "invincible doctor" role, but in the way that they view their patients and the doctor-patient relationship. While some books have been written from first-person perspectives on doctors who get sick-- by Oliver Sacks among them-- and TV shows like "House" touch on the topic, never has there been a "systematic, integrated look" at what the experience is like for doctors who get sick, and what it can teach us about our current health care system and more broadly, the experience of becoming ill.The psychiatrist Robert Klitzman here weaves together gripping first-person accounts of the experience of doctors who fall ill and see the other side of the coin, as a patient. The accounts reveal how dramatic this transformation can be-- a spiritual journey for some, a radical change of identity for others, and for some a new way of looking at the risks and benefits of treatment options. For most however it forever changes the way they treat their own patients. These questions are important not just on a human interest level, but for what they teach us about medicine in America today. While medical technology advances, the health care system itself has become more complex and frustrating, and physician-patient trust is at an all-time low. The experiences offered here are unique resource that point the way to a more humane future.
Download or read book What Doctors Feel written by Danielle Ofri, MD and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2013-06-04 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A fascinating journey into the heart and mind of a physician” that explores the doctor-patient relationship, the flaws in our health care system, and how doctors’ emotions impact medical care (Boston Globe) While much has been written about the minds and methods of the medical professionals who save our lives, precious little has been said about their emotions. Physicians are assumed to be objective, rational beings, easily able to detach as they guide patients and families through some of life’s most challenging moments. But understanding doctors’ emotional responses to the life-and-death dramas of everyday practice can make all the difference on giving and getting the best medical care. Digging deep into the lives of doctors, Dr. Danielle Ofri examines the daunting range of emotions—shame, anger, empathy, frustration, hope, pride, occasionally despair, and sometimes even love—that permeate the contemporary doctor-patient connection. Drawing on scientific studies, including some surprising research, Dr. Ofri offers up an unflinching look at the impact of emotions on health care. Dr. Ofri takes us into the swirling heart of patient care, telling stories of caregivers caught up and occasionally torn down by the whirlwind life of doctoring. She admits to the humiliation of an error that nearly killed one of her patients. She mourns when a beloved patient is denied a heart transplant. She tells the riveting stories of an intern traumatized when she is forced to let a newborn die in her arms, and of a doctor whose daily glass of wine to handle the frustrations of the ER escalates into a destructive addiction. Ofri also reveals that doctors cope through gallows humor, find hope in impossible situations, and surrender to ecstatic happiness when they triumph over illness.
Download or read book Dear People with Love and Care Your Doctors written by Debraj Shome and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2019-08-10 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From time immemorial, medicine has remained one of the most respected professions. Trust formed the unshakeable foundation of the doctor-patient relationship and, for long, doctors were treated next to God. In recent times, though, this sacred relationship is suffering from an erosion of faith. We often hear discouraging stories of doctors being abused and hospitals vandalised. The narrative is gradually turning negative-a dismal reality for both doctors and patients. We tend to forget that there are many great things happening in the medical world. Today, we are living much longer, we have managed to eradicate many diseases, we have vaccines that prevent our children from dying, life-saving surgeries are being performed while the baby is still in the womb, and we can give the gift of life to someone by transplanting vital organs. Medical miracles are happening every day in hospitals worldwide. This book is a collection of heartfelt stories by doctors and patients from across the globe. These are stories of triumph, empathy, positivity, loss and, sometimes, failure. It goes one step ahead and captures the experience of people who surround a doctor-the mother of a doctor, a surgeon's husband and an acid attack survivor-stories that underline that a doctor too is a human being after all. Human resilience can often break barriers, and these stories serve as inspiration to both patients and doctors alike. Riveting and absolutely unputdownable, Dear People gives an inside view of the world of medicine and hopes to inspire millions to retain faith in this beautiful relationship.
Download or read book The Best Care Possible written by Ira Byock and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2013-03-05 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A doctor on the front lines of hospital care illuminates one of the most important and controversial social issues of our time. It is harder to die in this country than ever before. Though the vast majority of Americans would prefer to die at home—which hospice care provides—many of us spend our last days fearful and in pain in a healthcare system ruled by high-tech procedures and a philosophy to “fight disease and illness at all cost.” Dr. Ira Byock, one of the foremost palliative-care physicians in the country, argues that how we die represents a national crisis today. To ensure the best possible elder care, Dr. Byock explains we must not only remake our healthcare system but also move beyond our cultural aversion to thinking about death. The Best Care Possible is a compelling meditation on medicine and ethics told through page-turning life-or-death medical drama. It has the power to lead a new national conversation.
Download or read book Practice Makes Perfect written by David Roberts, M.d. and published by Createspace Independent Pub. This book was released on 2013-02-22 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Have you ever wondered what is going on inside your doctor's head when you're behind that closed examination room door? Practice Makes Perfect: How One Doctor Found the Meaning of Lives helps us to understand the potential depth, sanctity, and humor within the doctor-patient relationship from both perspectives, as Dr. David Roberts makes rounds and cares for patients.Dr. Roberts has just completed his medical training and starts out in the private practice of Internal Medicine in a Midwestern college town. He is twenty-nine years old, but looks sixteen, inspiring most patients to comment, “You look too young to be a doctor!” On his first week of hospital rounds, an angry middle-aged man dies in such a dramatic, direct manner that our doctor, and the young nurse working with him, believe he has killed this patient. From this point onward, we listen and learn with Dr. Roberts and Dr. Mark Edwards, his senior partner, as they together navigate their first five years of private practice as primary care physicians. Written in the currently popular narrative non-fiction style, throughout Practice Makes Perfect the reader follows Dr. Roberts as he cares for twenty different and unique patients. As he encounters each new human being seeking help, we are invited inside the good physician's head to see and better understand the complexity of both successful and strained patient-doctor relationships. The reader sees him quickly formulate his initial impressions, analyze the data, argue with himself and sometimes others, including his patients, and struggle with his own doubts and certainties in order to help his patients to heal.Through a series of fascinating, humorous, and poignant patient stories, this “professional coming of age” book chronicles Dr. Robert's journey of finding the human dignity in each patient and learning something about himself, to a growing confidence in his abilities as a physician. Using a lively and entertaining style, the author takes us inside his own mind to help us understand what doctors think, say and do, (and what they don't say or do), each time we walk into the examination room as patients seeking help for our maladies.We see Doctor Roberts honestly reflect upon his own failures, successes, doubts and certainties, to learn the truth that his patients have to teach him about life. In discovering each person's innate dignity, he finds his own true calling as a physician and healer.Each chapter begins with an epigraph, setting the stage for the patient story. In addition to meeting and learning from each patient, the reader also follows the growth and development of the fledgling practice from the first two physicians, Drs. Edwards and Roberts, to the addition of new partners, until they at last outgrow their small office and move to a new professional office building adjacent to their hospital. Recognized as one of America's Best Doctors for many years, the author's broad experiences as a practicing physician, a hospital and medical group executive, and national speaker allow him to paint an exciting and heartrending portrait of our healthcare system, and help the reader to find his or her place within it.You simply cannot listen to the news these days without hearing about what is wrong with healthcare. In stark contrast, seeing patients with Dr. Roberts helps us understand both what is right, and what could be better, about ourselves and our relationships with physicians, as we seek and then discover with him the dignity of each human spirit.
Download or read book The Best Medicine written by Walt MD Larimore and published by Revell. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Dr. Walt Larimore moved his young family to Kissimmee, Florida, to start a small-town medical practice in 1985, he had no idea he was embarking on an enterprise that would change his life in ways both large and small. But there's no telling what you'll run into as a family physician in a rural, small-town community. Perfect for anyone yearning for a simpler, slower pace of life, as well as fans of Dr. Larimore's popular Bryson City series, The Best Medicine is a tender and insightful collection of stories chronicling one young doctor's passage from inexperience to maturity as a physician, husband, father, and community member. Filled with characters colorful and crusty, warm-hearted and hot-headed, witty and winsome, these captivating stories glow with warmth, love, and humor. You'll laugh, you'll cry, and you'll wish Dr. Larimore was your doctor.
Download or read book GOOD TIMES IN THE HOSPITAL written by JAMES G. McCULLY, MD and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2012-10 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Good Times in the Hospital is a collection of unlikely stories, poignant vignettes, and humorous anecdotes gathered from a lifetime of experience with real doctors and patients. As the setting moves from Duke University Medical School, to The Mayo Clinic, to an inner-city charity hospital, to a military hospital, to private hospitals in metropolitan centers and rural towns, this inside look at hospital life allows the reader to gradually gain a new perspective on medical men and women: They are not much different from the rest of us. After forty years of medical education and hospital practice, the author concludes that, "Doctors are no worse than other people." As for the patients in these stories although hospitals are engaged in the most serious business imaginable you cannot find more laugh-out-loud behavior anywhere. This is because when people are seeking medical care, they are vulnerable and reveal their true, inner selves. And, it turns out that the true, inner selves of most people are often some combination of fascinating, inexplicable, and ridiculous. To paraphrase a quote by Mel Brooks: "So long as this old world keeps spinning around and around, every person riding on it will occasionally get dizzy and do something stupid." Good Times in the Hospital reminds us that it is unhealthy to take life too seriously and a lighthearted temperament is just as important as a sound diet. This point of view makes it possible for one book to combine a rare glimpse inside the hospital, an informative look at health care, and an entertaining collection of anecdotes. There are chapters about juvenile practical jokes among medical students, mistakes by doctors in training, serious life lessons learned at the bedside, hospital affairs that end badly, doctors threatening other doctors with handguns, a girl who tries to stop her grandma's pacemaker with an MR scanner, an identical twin who has the surgery intended for her sister, an old man patiently waiting his turn in a charity hospital emergency room while holding his intestines in his hand, boyhood memories of a doctor who accompanied his father making house calls, a doctor who missed his chance to win a Nobel Prize by not listening to his patient, an intriguing case of domestic abuse, fascinating hypochondriacs, insights into why intelligent people spend their last dollar on irrational treatments, amazing examples of cures by mind over matter, the importance of our attitude on our wellness, and even reflections on the question of medical miracles. Is it appropriate to laugh at the behavior of doctors attending their patients and entertain ourselves with yarns of patients in their sickbed? Good Times in the Hospital promotes the viewpoint that the best way to deal with our inevitable foibles is to laugh about them. The author says, "If you believe that some things are sacrosanct and immune from humor, you are reading the wrong book." In an epilogue following this rich tapestry of medical tales, the author offers some final thoughts on how to sort through medical advice, a discussion of alternative medicine, the real effect of malpractice lawsuits on doctors, and the responsibility of patients for their own health. This epilogue is a rare opportunity to hear from an experienced, retired physician on such matters. Such frank opinions are virtually never discussed by doctors in practice, who must be circumspect in what they say for fear of alienating their patients, losing their insurance coverage, or becoming the target of a law firm. Mostly though, Good Times in the Hospital is an insightful panoply of true-life stories that illustrate the best and worst of human nature, a chance for the reader to have some fun and learn a little along the way.
Download or read book My Own Medicine written by Geoffrey Kurland and published by Diversion Books. This book was released on 2013-11-22 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Approaching his forty-first birthday, Dr. Geoffrey Kurland was a busy man. His work as a Pediatric Pulmonologist , caring for children with lung diseases such as cystic fibrosis and asthma, led to long hours on the wards at the University of California, Davis Medical Center. At the same time, he was in the midst of training for the Western States Endurance Run, a grueling 100-mile long footrace across the wilderness of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. His long training runs, the responsibilities of patient care and teaching, and relationships attempting to replace his departed girlfriend occupied most of his life. Dr. Kurland’s ordered world is suddenly turned upside-down when he is diagnosed with Hairy Cell Leukemia, a rare blood cancer with a low survival rate. His work, his running, and his friendships are altered by his struggle to survive. He finds he must undergo many of the procedures he performed on his patients, must endure surgery and chemotherapy, and must relinquish control of his life to his physicians, surgeons, and his disease. He learns first-hand what cannot be taught in medical school about the consuming power of a chronic illness and its treatment. Confronting his own mortality, Dr. Kurland is now the patient while remaining a physician and runner. With the support of his physicians at the Mayo Clinic, the University of California, and the University of Pittsburgh, he resolves to continue to live his life despite his potentially fatal disease. He discovers his personal inner strengths as well as weaknesses as he struggles to confront his illness and regain some of the control he lost to it. Along his nearly two and a half year journey, we follow Dr. Kurland as he endures surgical procedures, chemotherapy, and life-threatening complications of his illness. He emerges into remission with new inner strength and understanding of what it means to be a doctor. He also finds that he is still a runner, with the same goal, to run the 100 miles across the Sierra Mountains. PRAISE: “Taut, dramatic, and intensely real…Very well written.” —Oliver Sacks, bestselling author of Seeing Voices and Hallucinations "[My Own Medicine] should be required reading for every medical professional. Kurland never asks for sympathy or pity...What comes through powerfully is his humanity, which his own bout with illnesses has clearly enhanced, and from which both his patients and his readers will benefit." —The New York Times "While training as a pediatric pulmonologist, Kurland told a patient, 'I know how you feel'; years later, when he was diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia, he discovered just how untrue this was...The way in which serious illness alters one's sense of self and of life is compellingly expressed in this energetic, nervy narrative, as Kurland's illness and eventual recovery collide with a host of profound shifts—a big career move, the death of a colleague, an unravelling relationship with his girlfriend, and a deepening one with his parents." —The New Yorker
Download or read book The Medicine written by Karen Hitchcock and published by Black Inc.. This book was released on 2020-02-04 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What happens when a doctor kills a patient? Are GPs overprescribing antidepressants? Does ‘female Viagra’ work? What role can psychedelics and cannabis play in treating pain? What is sickness, and how much of it is in our heads? In The Medicine, Dr Karen Hitchcock takes us to the frontlines of everyday treatment, turning her acute gaze to everything from the flu season to dementia, plastic surgery to the humble sick day. In an overcrowded, underfunded medical system, she explores how more of us can be healthier, and how listening carefully to a patient’s experience can be as important as prescribing a pill. These dazzling essays show Hitchcock to be one of the most fearless and illuminating medical thinkers of our time – reasonable, insightful and deeply humane. ‘The Medicine is elegantly and startlingly wise about the body and the mind, the miracles and limits of modern medicine, the way we live now and the ways we don't. Read it and you will look at yourself differently. Not only that - you'll look at your doctor differently.’ —Don Watson ‘Karen Hitchcock does some of the best writing in Australia’ —Leigh Sales
Download or read book Talking with Doctors Expanded 2nd Edition written by David Newman and published by . This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reviews "As his story unfolds, the reader is comforted in knowing that he must have made it through, because he lived to write about it. But the book is no less riveting.... He writes of the difficulty that even a confident, educated man can have in talking with doctors. He confronted egos, condescension, excuses -- even lies. He ran into odd forms of compassion, such as the physician who instructed his receptionist to return Newman's $10 co-payment, as though the gesture would help compensate a man who just learned he might die soon. He also found doctors who asked about his family, who walked him to the cab stand when he appeared too shaky to move, who followed through with phone calls to get test results more quickly. From all of them, no matter how much he may have wished for a miracle, he never expected one. He wanted only a full version of truth that he could understand." -- Susan Brink, "Los Angeles Times" "Reading Newman's cautionary story will be preventive medicine for the public and should be included in the continuing education of every physician." -- David Gordon, M.D., Professor of Radiology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine "This book should be required reading for all medical students, and could well form the basis for a course entitled 'Being and Finding the Best Doctor'." -- William Silen, M.D., Johnson & Johnson Professor of Surgery, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School Product Description Without any warning, in September, 1999 David Newman was told he had a rare and life-threatening tumor in the base of his skull. At the time, he had three young children and was a psychotherapist in New York with patients of his own. In the compressed space of five weeks, he consulted with leading physicians and surgeons at four major medical centers. The doctors offered drastically differing opinions; several pronounced the tumor inoperable and voiced skepticism about the effectiveness of any nonsurgical treatment. Newman was told to get his affairs in order. But he proved the doctors wrong. "Talking with Doctors" is an absorbing and unsettling story that touches a collective raw nerve about the experience of doctors and medical care when life-threatening illness leads us to subspecialists at major medical centers. And it is a dramatic rendering of major changes in the doctor-patient relationship that have occurred over the past three decades. Probing the nature of medical authority and the grounds of a trusting doctor-patient relationship, Newman illuminates with grace and power what it now means for a patient to participate in life-and-death medical decisions. In the expanded 2nd edition, Newman brings readers up to date on a medical odyssey that did not end with the events recounted in the original edition. It was renewed especially in 2008 when he suffered a recurrence of skull base tumor, this time inoperable, and was forced to a new and perplexing round of talking with doctors as he struggled to clarify his options and ensure his survival. Newman's treacherous journey, filtered through his discerning intellect and fine literary sensibility, is a life-affirming gift to his readers. He is brilliantly self-reflective about a life lived fully yet precariously for 11 years with the aid of doctors and state-of-the-art treatment.
Download or read book Routine Miracles written by Conrad Fischer and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-10-30 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “This book covers medical advances that would once have been called miracles but have now become routine. The patients’ stories within this book yield hope, optimism, and triumph. This is the best time ever to come out of medical school and training. This fact will inspire and uplift everyone in the medical profession as well as all of us who must, at some point, rely on the art of medicine to see us through.” —Conrad Fischer, MD What has ruined today’s medical students’ interest in devoting their lives to finding cures for the most rampant diseases riddling our population? How can young doctors not be energized and excited by modern breakthroughs? Why are they not inspired by the ability of current AIDS drugs to increase life expectancy by twenty-five years? In Routine Miracles, award-winning internist and medical educator Conrad Fischer investigates the disconnect between medical advances and the rise of physician dissatisfaction. Fischer surveyed more than 3,000 physicians and interviewed hundreds of patients to uncover the seeds of doctors’ discontent. Based upon his findings, he offers a deeply personal and compelling call to action for all of us, doctor and patient alike, to celebrate the present and the future of medicine.
Download or read book Doctors in the Making written by Suzanne Poirier and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent surveys of medical students reveal stark conditions: more than a quarter have experienced episodes of depression during their medical school and residency careers, a figure much higher than that of the general population. Compounded by long hours of intellectually challenging, physically taxing, and emotionally exhausting work, medical school has been called one of the most harrowing experiences a student can encounter. Plumbing the diaries, memoirs, and blogs of physicians-in-training, Suzanne Poirier's Doctors in the Making illuminates not just the process by which students become doctors but also the physical, emotional, and spiritual consequences of the process. Through close readings of these accounts, Poirier draws attention to the complex nature of power in medicine, the rewards and hazards of professional and interpersonal relationships in all aspects of physicians' lives, and the benefits to and threats from the vulnerability that medical students and residents experience. Although most students emerge from medical education as well-trained, well-prepared professionals, few of them will claim that they survived the process unscathed. The authors of these accounts document--for better or for worse--the ways in which they have been changed. Based on their stories, Poirier recommends that medical education should make room for the central importance of personal relationships, the profound sense of isolation and powerlessness that can threaten the wellbeing of patients and physicians alike, and the physical and moral vulnerability that are part of every physician's life.
