From a physician with a half century of experience practicing in the emergency room, a memoir reflecting on treating patients and exploring the ethical questions that arise when caring for a stranger in their moment of crisis.
The 21 friendly, well-carved vignettes he shares in Patient Care penetrate the mysteries of emergency medicine while underscoring the compassion, skill, and dedication of the modest practitioner/author ... It’s a highly pressurized workplace in which minutes, even seconds, can mean the difference between life and death. Seward emphasizes this reality over and over. And he makes the stakes feel real for readers ... Whether describing the obstinacy of patients, the brave faces worn by worried relatives, the technical aspects of repairing injured bodies, or the elation of helping potential catastrophes end well, Paul Seward fills his attractively written narrative with authoritative detail, strong emotion, and a precise sense of place.
As a respected physician for over 50 years, Dr. Seward regales the reader with slice-of-life vignettes that both illustrate and educate us about myriad aspects of medicine including both the physical and emotional ones. Not only is each case a bit different but there are often unusual complexities involved no matter how routine a set of symptoms appears to be ... an unusual memoir readers will not forget. If one is unfamiliar with emergency medicine, it will be an educational experience told with enough real-life drama to keep one interested and may further an interest in the field. Some readers, however, may perceive a drawback in the book. At just over 220 pages, the brevity of Patient Care: Death and Life in the Emergency Room can be viewed as a bit disappointing. There must be so many more fascinating stories to include in a book such as this one, particularly when they are told so well.
Seward’s engrossing and approachable memoir plunges readers into the unpredictable life of an emergency-room physician ... His humble recollections are sad yet joyful, moving yet lighthearted. Seward’s memoir is easy to read, just the right length, and packed with stories that will capture readers’ attention. In the increasingly popular medical-memoir genre, this one stands out.
