Medical Memoirs

Internationally acclaimed neurosurgeon Dr Eben Alexander always considered himself a man of science. His unwavering belief in evidence-based medicine fuelled a career in the top medical institutions of the world. But all this was set to change. One morning in 2008 he fell into a coma after suffering a rare form of bacterial meningitis. Scans of his brain revealed massive damage. Death was deemed the most likely outcome.

Tired of the pace and noise of life near London and longing for a better place to raise their young children, Mary J. MacLeod and her husband, George, encountered their dream while vacationing on a remote island in the Scottish Hebrides. Enthralled by its windswept beauty, they soon were the proud and startled owners of a near-derelict croft house - a farmer’s stone cottage - on “a small acre” of land. Mary assumed duties as the island’s district nurse.

One morning in 2008, desperate and impoverished while trying unsuccessfully to write, Davidson plucked a flyer out of his mailbox that read, "Bus Drivers Wanted". That was the first step toward an unlikely new career: driving a school bus full of special-needs kids for a year. Armed only with a sense of humor akin to that of his charges, a creative approach to the challenge of driving a large, awkward vehicle while corralling a rowdy gang of kids, and unexpected reserves of empathy, Davidson takes us along for the ride.

DESPRE AUDIOBOOK. Poate că nimic nu ne pregătește pentru confesiunile brutal de sincere ale unui copil diferit de restul lumii, ajuns la maturitate. Patric Gagne a avut curajul să relateze cu lux de amănunte drumul de la inocență și deznădejde la maturitate și speranță. De la condamnare socială și respingere la prețuire publică și acceptare. Este vorba despre o aventură năucitoare prin labirintul tenebros al unei afecțiuni mintale care oferă, prea des, numai perspective sumbre. Dar apare o scânteie. Desigur, dragostea. E singura lumină călăuzitoare.

One in three births is traumatic. It doesn’t have to be that way. Rebecca planned to give birth at the hospital affiliated with her university. But hospital practices and policies that were more than 20 years out of date left her with complications that seemed preventable. Embark on a journey with Rebecca as she exposes the stark realities of institutional care during childbirth and reveals inspirational solutions for parents and professionals alike.

Ken Holmes worked in the Marin County Coroner's Office for 36 years, starting as a death investigator and ending as the three-term, elected coroner. As he grew into the job - which is different from what is depicted on television - Holmes learned a variety of skills, from finding hidden clues at death scenes, interviewing witnesses effectively, managing bystanders and reporters, preparing testimony for court, to notifying families of a death with sensitivity and compassion.

In this award-winning memoir, two sisters reckon with the convalescence and death of their outlandishly tyrannical mother and the care of their psychologically terrorized father, all relayed with dark humor and brutal honesty.

Nine million Americans are touched by aneurysms during their lifetimes. This is one story of love. Brainstorm is the candid and powerful memoir of the author's harrowing experience of an aneurysm and his road to recovery. It is a journey of love and devotion and a clash of medical beliefs and countercultures.

A political journalist and activist, Cousins was also a professor of medical humanities at UCLA, where he studied the biochemistry of human emotions and their relationship to healing. When Cousins was hospitalized with a debilitating collagen illness, he decided to take his health into his own hands. Cousins and his doctor combated the disease together by creating a regimen of laughter and vitamin C specifically calibrated to his needs. Against all odds, the treatment worked, proving to Cousins that a positive attitude was key to his improvement.

Henry Marsh has spent a lifetime operating on the surgical front line. There have been exhilarating highs and devastating lows, but his love for the practice of neurosurgery has never wavered. Following the publication of his celebrated New York Times best seller Do No Harm, Marsh retired from his full-time job in England to work pro bono in Ukraine and Nepal. In Admissions he describes the difficulties of working in these troubled, impoverished countries and the further insights it has given him into the practice of medicine.

In this follow-up to the hugely popular Angels in the ER, Dr. Robert D. Lesslie shares more of his life-changing emergency-room encounters with nurses, doctors, patients, friends, and strangers who’ve served as God’s hands in the direst of circumstances. You’ll be deeply moved by these tales of both triumph and tragedy from the ER front line, as well as by the profound faith that has sustained Dr. Lesslie for more than 30 years on the job.

As a third-year Harvard Medical student doing a clinical rotation in surgery, Ronald Epstein watched an experienced surgeon fail to notice his patient's kidney turning an ominous shade of blue. In that same rotation, Epstein was awestruck by another surgeon's ability to slow down and shift between autopilot and intentionality. The difference between these two doctors left a lasting impression on Epstein and set the stage for his life's work - to identify the qualities and habits that distinguish masterful doctors from those who are merely competent.

When Damon Tweedy begins medical school, he envisions a bright future where his segregated, working-class background will become largely irrelevant. Instead, he finds that he has joined a new world where race is front and center. The recipient of a scholarship designed to increase black student enrollment, Tweedy soon meets a professor who bluntly questions whether he belongs in medical school, a moment that crystallizes the challenges he will face throughout his career.

With a play opening on Broadway, and every reason to smile, Sarah Ruhl has just survived a high-risk pregnancy when she discovers the left side of her face is completely paralyzed. She is assured that 90 percent of Bell’s palsy patients experience a full recovery—like Ruhl’s own mother. But Sarah is in the unlucky ten percent. And for a woman, wife, mother, and artist working in theater, the paralysis and the disconnect between the interior and exterior brings significant and specific challenges.

Author Cory Franklin, MD, who headed the hospital's intensive care unit from the 1970s through the 1990s, shares his most unique and bizarre experiences, including the deadly Chicago heatwave of 1995, treating the first AIDS patients in the country before the disease was diagnosed, the nurse with rare Munchausen syndrome, the only surviving ricin victim, and the professor with Alzheimer's hiding the effects of the wrong medication.

With his tumultuous love life, relentless pursuit of a male heir, and drastic religious transformation, England's King Henry VIII's life sounds more like reality television than history. He was a man of fascinating contradictions. What could have caused his incredible paradoxes? Could there be a simple medical explanation for the king's descent into tyranny? Where do the answers lie? Blood will tell.

Kinder gives us a gripping and raw insight into the life of a first responder, an opportunity to see through an invaluable lens that few will ever experience first hand. More importantly, it’s a story of hope and redemption.

Diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), Jeff Sutherland lost his abilities to walk and speak within two years and, confined to a wheelchair, was forced to retire from his life's work as a physician at 43. Not long after, he was locked in his own inanimate body, unable to eat, drink, or breathe without assistance. His meals were delivered through a feeding tube, and a ventilator controlled his lungs through an opening in his throat. The only parts of his body he was able to move voluntarily were his eyes.

At the University of Wisconsin, Dr. Joshua Mezrich creates life from loss, transplanting organs from one body to another. In this intimate, profoundly moving work, he illuminates the extraordinary field of transplantation that enables this kind of miracle to happen every day.

An exploration of vision through the case histories of six individuals - including a renowned pianist who continues to give concerts despite losing the ability to read the score, and a neurobiologist born with crossed eyes who, late in life, suddenly acquires binocular vision, and how her brain adapts to that new skill.