Medical Memoirs

Was Andy Warhol a hoarder? Did Einstein have autism? Was Frank Lloyd Wright a narcissist? In this surprising, inventive, and meticulously researched look at the evolution of mental health, acclaimed health and science journalist Claudia Kalb gives listeners a glimpse into the lives of high-profile historic figures through the lens of modern psychology, weaving groundbreaking research into biographical narratives that are deeply embedded in our culture.

Thaïs is almost two. Like most well-loved children, she is happy. She laughs as she runs on the beach. But her footprints in the sand, with toes turned out, tell a different story. Two Small Footprints in Wet Sand relates the overwhelming tragedy experienced by a family as a result of a genetic disorder.

Suffering from severe neck and back injuries, Kerry was unemployed and housebound, struggling with depression and even thoughts of suicide. He went from cycling over 600 miles a month to becoming a prisoner in his own home. In the face of unbearable pain and overwhelming panic, he persevered, and along the way, met an adorable yard dog named Max. This is their remarkable, inspiring story.

His name was Joshua Silver. He was 23 years old, educated, and had an impressive vocabulary. The NYPD had found Joshua Silver naked in Times Square, barking like a dog. It was just another night for Julie Holland, the attending doctor in the world famous Bellevue Hospital's psychiatric emergency room.

At first glance, Anthony Chin-Quee looks like a traditional success story: a smart, ambitious kid who grew up to become a board-certified otolaryngologist—an ear, nose, and throat surgeon. Yet the truth is more complicated. As a self-described “not white, mostly Black, and questionably Asian man,” Chin-Quee knows that he doesn’t fit easily into any category. Growing up in a family with a background of depression, he struggled with relationships, feelings of inadequacy, and a fear of failure that made it difficult for him to forge lasting bonds with others.

Physician, researcher, and ethics professor Matt McCarthy is on the front lines of a groundbreaking clinical trial testing a new antibiotic to fight lethal superbugs, bacteria that have built up resistance to the life-saving drugs in our rapidly dwindling arsenal. This trial serves as the backdrop for the compulsively listenable Superbugs, and the results will impact nothing less than the future of humanity.

For centuries, the human heart seemed beyond our understanding: an inscrutable shuddering mass that was somehow the driver of emotion and the seat of the soul. As cardiologist and best-selling author Sandeep Jauhar tells in The Heart, it was only recently that we demolished age-old taboos and devised the transformative procedures that changed the way we live. Deftly alternating between historical episodes and his own work, Jauhar tells the colorful and little known story of the doctors who risked their careers and the patients who risked their lives to know and heal our most vital organ.

Anyone who lives with an eating disorder fights their own thoughts, their own anxieties, their own self, every second of every minute of every day. For Lizzie this was her reality from the age of 14. However through professional help, the support of her loving family, and her Christian faith, she somehow found the hope and strength to overcome. Life Hurts tells Lizzie's story, reflecting on it from her perspective as a doctor. Her vision is to inspire and encourage other to see that, although eating disorders can be devastating, there is hope for all of us.

Hannah Daly is a pediatric occupational therapist and an advanced sensory integration practitioner who is profoundly dyslexic, dyspraxic, and has sensory processing disorder. She has multiple university degrees but still cannot read or write. In Knowing No Boundaries, she gives an honest account of living with these hidden disabilities. This book is a unique coming-of-age, feel-good memoir that strikes the balance of vulnerability and humor.

Dr Dan Pronk served on over 100 combat missions in Afghanistan as a frontline special forces combat doctor, where the casualties he treated were his fellow SAS soldiers and commandos, local civilians and even the enemy. The thrill of adventure and the challenges of battlefield medicine brought out the very best in Dan; he discovered a sense of purpose in pushing his medical skills and courage to the limits. But there was a cost. In this frank memoir, Dan describes the highs and lows of his military-medical career, and the very real toll they took on his mental health and family life.

Veteran journalists Simon Pearson and Fiona Gorman follow the remarkable life of heart surgeon Magdi Yacoub from his formative years in Egypt, through spectacular success at Cairo University, to his long and distinguished career in Britain. Although at times he clashed with the medical establishment in London, Yacoub pioneered great advances in heart surgery. He was knighted in 1992, and in 2014, he was awarded the highest honor in the gift of the Queen, the Order of Merit.

Out of the crucible of medical training, award-winning writer Terrence Holt shapes this stunning account of residency, the years-long ordeal in which doctors are made. "Amid all the mess and squalor of the hospital, with its blind random unraveling of lives", Internal Medicine finds the compassion from which doctors discover the strength to care.

Cory Friedman woke up one morning when he was five years old with the uncontrollable urge to twitch his neck. From that day forward his life became a hell of irrepressible tics and involuntary utterances, and Cory embarked on an excruciating journey from specialist to specialist to discover the cause of his disease. Soon it became unclear what tics were symptoms of his disease and what were side effects of the countless combinations of drugs. The only certainty is that it kept getting worse. Simply put: Cory Friedman's life was a living hell.

Lisa Ray is one of India's first supermodels. She's also an actor, a cancer survivor, a mother of twins through surrogacy. She is a woman who has lived many lives. And this is her story. Close to the Bone is an unflinching, deeply moving account of Lisa Ray's life, tracing her childhood in Canada as the biracial daughter of an Indian man and a Polish woman, her rise as a popular Bollywood star, and her battle with a rare, incurable cancer.

When the most unimaginable tragedy occurred in her life, it was as though Dr. Annabelle had prepared for this very moment all along. Having her son Macario, and being told that the removal of 40% of his brain at five weeks old would greatly inhibit developmental processes both physically and mentally became the defining turn. Macario’s brain loss and Dr. Annabelle’s quick response became an awakening moment for Dr. Annabelle. This story of finding cannabis and taking risks to replace the medications that were initially given to him is compelling and inspirational.

In The Song of Our Scars, physician Haider Warraich offers a bold reexamination of the nature of pain, not as a simple physical sensation, but as a cultural experience. Warraich, himself a sufferer of chronic pain, considers the ways our notions of pain have been shaped not just by science but by politics and power, by whose suffering mattered and whose didn’t.

Has there ever been a time in your life when you’ve felt alone or unsure where to turn for answers? It may have come with the diagnosis of a life-threatening illness, loss of a job, a death of a loved one, or any trauma that threatened everything you knew to be true. In Unexpected: Finding Resilience through Functional Medicine, Science, and Faith, Dr. Jill Carnahan introduces a new paradigm for listeners who are going through uncertain times. For the skeptic or the faithful, Unexpected is a valuable guide for living an extraordinary life of love and resilience.

A healing resource that blends practical plant-based knowledge with spiritual reconnection to show how a respect for and communion with our natural world guides us toward healing.

A mesmerizing and courageous memoir: the story of two sisters uncovering the depth of their love through the life-and-death experience of a bone marrow transplant. Throughout her life Elizabeth Lesser has sought understanding about what it means to be true to yourself and, at the same time, truly connected to the ones you love. But when her sister, Maggie, needs a bone marrow transplant to save her life, and Lesser learns that she is the perfect match, she faces a far more immediate and complex question about what it really means to love.

Actor Jim Beaver (Supernatural, Deadwood, Justified) and his wife Cecily Adams (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's Moogie) were at the peaks of their careers and happily raising a beautiful two-year old daughter, Madeline. Then tragedy struck, not once, but twice. What followed was laid down by Jim in a moving, poignant, and uplifting journal of the following year, a year filled with heartbreak as well as enormous gifts and invaluable lessons, not just for Jim and his family but for listeners who traveled along with him on his journey.