Better
A Surgeon's Notes on Performance
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Narrated by:
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John Bedford Lloyd
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Written by:
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Atul Gawande
About this listen
National best seller
The New York Times best-selling author of Being Mortal and Complications examines, in riveting accounts of medical failure and triumph, how success is achieved in a complex and risk-filled profession
The struggle to perform well is universal: each one of us faces fatigue, limited resources, and imperfect abilities in whatever we do. But nowhere is this drive to do better more important than in medicine, where lives are on the line with every decision. In this book, Atul Gawande explores how doctors strive to close the gap between best intentions and best performance in the face of obstacles that sometimes seem insurmountable.
Gawande's gripping stories of diligence, ingenuity, and what it means to do right by people take us to battlefield surgical tents in Iraq, to labor and delivery rooms in Boston, to a polio outbreak in India, and to malpractice courtrooms around the country. He discusses the ethical dilemmas of doctors' participation in lethal injections, examines the influence of money on modern medicine, and recounts the astoundingly contentious history of hand washing. And as in all his writing, Gawande gives us an inside look at his own life as a practicing surgeon, offering a searingly honest firsthand account of work in a field where mistakes are both unavoidable and unthinkable.
At once unflinching and compassionate, Better is an exhilarating journey narrated by "arguably the best nonfiction doctor-writer around" (Salon). Gawande's investigation into medical professionals and how they progress from merely good to great provides rare insight into the elements of success, illuminating every area of human endeavor.
©2007 Atul Gawande (P)2007 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers, LLCYou may also enjoy...
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Sometimes in medicine the only way to know what is truly going on in a patient is to operate, to look inside with one's own eyes. This audio is exploratory surgery on medicine itself, laying bare a science not in its idealized form, but as it actually is - complicated, perplexing, and profoundly human. Atul Gawande offers an unflinching view from the scalpel's edge, where science is ambiguous, information is limited, the stakes are high. In dramatic and revealing stories of patients and doctors, he explores how deadly mistakes occur and why good surgeons go bad.
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Being Mortal
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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Overall
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Performance
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- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
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-
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- Written by: Dr. Chris Honey
- Narrated by: Dr. Chris Honey
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this absorbing narrative, Dr. Chris Honey, an accomplished neurosurgeon at Vancouver General Hospital, weaves his personal journey together with case studies that reflect the thrill of scientific discovery and the limitations of medicine. Operating on a terminally ill child amid an Ebola outbreak in Liberia, he questions his preconceptions about what it means to "win" against a disease. Reflecting on his own path into neurosurgery, he brings to life a relatively new, high stakes field of medicine—one that historically demanded emotional detachment and often attracts extreme personalities
-
-
Very detailed medical stories & history
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Written by: Dr. Chris Honey
-
The House of God
- Written by: Samuel Shem
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
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- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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Performance
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Sometimes in medicine the only way to know what is truly going on in a patient is to operate, to look inside with one's own eyes. This book is exploratory surgery on medicine itself, laying bare a science not in its idealized form but as it actually is - complicated, perplexing, and profoundly human.
-
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Good stories shared
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
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Unnatural Causes
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Overall
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Performance
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Exceptional
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What the critics say
"Surgeon and MacArthur fellow Gawande applies his gift for dulcet prose to medical and ethical dilemmas in this collection." (Publishers Weekly)
"Better is a masterpiece, a series of stories set inside the four walls of a hospital that end up telling us something unforgettable about the world outside." (Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink and The Tipping Point)
What listeners say about Better
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Van Dong Nguyen
- 2023-07-07
Great writing and reflexion
The author expresses with great words the important to uphold best standard of practice
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- Amazon Customer
- 2018-07-18
love it
As a future hopeful doc this was extremely insightful. Dr. Gawande has a very personal way of writing. Very interesting.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 2025-01-10
Intriguing examples and detailed research
Great stories that inspire physicians to be better. Like the 5 tips at the end of the book.
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