Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande
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Book Reviews of Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance
Book Review: An Important Message for Everyone
Summary: 5 Stars
Atul Gawande wrote a book about a surgeon's life and work, but it really applies to anyone in all walks of life. We all have an opportunity to improve the way we do things - an opportunity to be more careful, to measure how we do things, to connect with others, and to share our discoveries with others - as I am doing now.
This work opened up insights into how medicine works - which I have only seen up to now from the prospective of a patient or patient's family member. Doctors have unique challenges, but too often they (like the rest of us) just accept the way they have always done things because it is all they know.
As I read this book, I learned how individual doctors made a significant difference in the treatment of difficult diseases, but not only wanting to do better, but by stepping out of the routine to actually do better.
I have a slight criticism with the author's discussion of early detection as prevention - a common error - particularly as we learn their limitations. I wish he focused more on steps we can take that really lower disease and mortality, such as not smoking.
I especially like the five suggestions of the final chapter of the book which I won't list here to let other discover as they read this very worthwhile book.
Book Review: Atul Probes Deeply
Summary: 5 Stars
Atul Gwande's "Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance" is a collection of essays that probe skillfully and poignantly into the depths of medical ethics and the performance of doctors. He is a fine researcher and an astute observer who carefully delineates many facets of each issue that he explores, be it washing hands, malpractice concerns, or the Apgar score.
As a non-fiction writer, I was acutely aware of how adept Gawande is at using narrative to illustrate and discuss complex moral and ethical issues. He does not skirt controversial notions such as what happens to the soldiers who have been saved from grave injury on the battlefield and come home limbless and with horribly scared faces? Or why hospitals avoid publicizing the results of their effectiveness in treating certain conditions?
At the end of his book, he makes five suggestions about how doctors might make a worthy difference. All of these suggestions make sense for anyone wanting to make a difference. I'm only going to mention one that hits close to home: He says, "write something. . . it makes no difference if you write five paragraphs for a blog, a paper for a professional journal, or a poem for a reading group. Just write."
Let me add, just read Gwande's "Better."
Book Review: Mandatory Reading for All Involved in Healthcare
Summary: 5 Stars
Atul Gawende's "Better" should be mandatory reading for anyone engaged in providing, regulating, or legislating health services. Gawende, a general surgeon who specializes in endocrine surgery at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital, has written a provocative and insightful book on how we can improve healthcare today. He is quick to admit that true success in medicine is not easy. It requires will, attention to detail, and creativity.
"Better" shows, however, that it is possible anywhere and by anyone. The author illustrates this with case studies showing how diligence, doing it right, and ingenuity can make a big difference.
Gawende argues that once we've made a science of "performance" - as he shows with simple examples of hand washing, a polio "mop-up,"wounded soldiers, child delivery - thousands of lives can be saved. Today, the scientific effort to improve performance gets only a miniscule portion of scientific budgets. Yet it can arguably save more lives in the next decade than bench science, more lives than research on the genome, stem cell therapy, cancer vaccines, and all the other laboratory work we see in the press. The stakes are high.
Gawende is arguable the best nonfiction doctor-writer around today.
Book Review: Much better
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is a compilation of essays some of which have been published elsewhere as was the case with his first work, COMPLICATIONS. There the comparison ends. Dr Gawande's writing and attitude have grown and matured. Here we see the professor who provokes us to thought as well as teaches.
The book opens with an introduction which was a story of how a senior resident senses that a patient may be sicker than her vital signs reveal. Following his clinical judgment he is more judicious than most would be. By his judiciousness he saves a patient's life. This essay sets the stage for book.
The book is divided into 3 sections Diligence, Doing Right and Ingenuity, the qualities he feels doctors need to embody. Then he uses the power of story to illustrate those qualities. He raises procative questions.
He shares with us fascinating stories some that are inspiring and others that are disappointing, others controversial. All give us pause for thought .
This is a book that all of us should read especially now a health care reform must occur and we are facing the question How can we do better?
Book Review: A Medical Drama - an insider looking out
Summary: 5 Stars
Atul Gawande asks the hard questions. How can a doctor who is just a human be expected to be a god? Gawande looks at the profession from the mundane (hand washing) to the ethical mountain tops (physicians attending executions). The odd thing is that the death row docs have not killed nearly as many people, in the big picture, as the ones who forget to sufficiently scrub up.
Dr. Gawande tells us about the challenges and changes in obstetrics, cystic fibrosis, and the use of chaperones in examining rooms, trauma practice and many other little niches in the health care system from an insider's point of view.
This is a well written real life look into the daily life of a modern day physician documenting all the medical and ethical decisions that affect both the doc and the patient. He is quite frank with many of his judgment calls but never gets too technical that the book is difficult to read for the layman. This is a good read.....BG