physician and patient

"In my session with Imogen, the words were still not coming. I had to move past my own frustration and relax. But it is very hard to relax when you are looking into the eyes of a mute little girl who wants to be dead. You don't want to relax; you want to pull her into your arms, hold her and then shake her until she tells you why. You long to say, "Why do you want to die? You're twelve years old." Gripping, unforgettable and deeply affecting, The Skeleton Cupboard recounts the patient stories that most influenced Professor Tanya Byron, covering years of training that forced her to confront the harsh realities of the lives of her patients and the demons of her own family's history. Among others, we meet Ray, a violent sociopath desperate to be treated with tenderness and compassion; Mollie, a talented teenager intent on starving herself; and Imogen, a twelve-year old so haunted by a secret that she's intent on killing herself. Byron brings the reader along as she uncovers the reasons each of these individuals behave the way they do, resulting in a thrilling, compulsively readable psychological mystery that sheds light on mental illness and what its treatment tells us about ourselves"--.

Most people will, at some point or another, either find themselves dressed in a tiny hospital gown or staring at someone else dressed in a tiny hospital gown. Whether from the perspective of a patient, a family member, or a medical professional, we all have a significant stake in the process of medical education. While numerous memoirs recount physicians' grueling experiences during residency, few focus on the even more formative portion of medical training: the third year of medical school-the clinical year. Short White Coat: Lessons from Patients on Becoming a Doctor is the disarmingly honest, yet endearing and sometimes funny account of a medical student's humbling initiation into the world of patient care.

During her three years as a resident in internal medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle, Transue wrote about her patients as a way to guard against burnout and share her experiences with friends and family. This moving collection of her stories conveys vividly, sometimes painfully, the atmosphere of overwork, exhaustion and insecurity in which a resident works; the long shifts and sleepless nights, the moments when she cannot contain her tears, the times when she is haunted by fears that she has made the wrong decision.

When two of Dr. Michael Grant's patients die unexpectedly and show the same perplexing symptoms, Grant searches for a scientific explanation while the local pastor suggests that the cause is not from this world.

Interviews and case studies focus on young people coping with serious illnesses of a chronic or fatal nature, either in themselves of a family member, and examine the effects on the entire family.

Dr. Michael Stein provides an account of the treatment, relapse, and long-term recovery of Lucy, a young woman who came to him for help in ridding herself of a prescription drug addiction, and provides insights into how doctors think about addiction, their decision-making process, and how addiction should be regarded and treated.

Forty-three-year-old surgeon Dr. Ted Cogan struggles to clear his name when he is accused of statutory rape and manslaughter after seventeen-year-old and former patient Kristen Kroiter kills herself, leaving behind a diary that provides details describing a sexual encounter.

While prison psychiatrist Louise Forrest tries to help female inmate Helen--who blames the voices in her head for the murders of her children and believes that Hollywood starlet Angie Mills is her sister--she copes with her own problems with the actress, who coincidentally is dating her ex-husband and caring for her son.