What Doctors Feel: How Emotions Affect the Practice of Medicine

All ok

Interesting, well written and pleasant . I would suggest this book to anybody interested in knowing more about the perspective of doctors during medical practice.

Danielle Ofri's book, What Doctors Feel, is one that should be required reading in all medical schools, and it should also be read by all patients to help them better navigate the undercurrents of their relationships and experiences with their doctors, particularly, as these undercurrents involve the generally unspoken emotions and fears of, and the risks to, their physicians.As both a long-time patient with extremely complex medical conditions, and someone who has always been fascinated by medicine (I read medical textbooks for fun as a teenager), I thought that my knowledge of the world of doctors and medicine was more than adequate. Yet, after reading Ofri's book, one physician's apology to me, and another's visceral reaction to the suggestion by another physician that he perform a surgery on me that might be medically necessary, but that would, inevitably, leave me disabled to some degree, took on entirely different shadings and nuances, and I learned a great deal that I would never have otherwise known.Yet, do not get the idea that this book is dry, or aimed at teaching some sort of lesson, or written to either apologize for or explain away the negative behaviors of physicians. Quite the opposite on all counts. The book is engaging, enlightening, compelling, and brilliantly written. What might indeed have been dry material in other hands is, quite literally, a page-turner in Ofri's. I read the book cover-to-cover in two sittings. As readers, we learn about how the doctors in the book feel through their encounters with patients, some whom they have grown to love, and through the tortuous and exacting training that medical students endure in order to become physicians. And, we too, grow to love some of the patients, and to empathize with both the doctors and their patients, and we care about their stories as much as we do about the stories of our favorite fictitious characters. Yet, every person and every story in this book is real--each was lived by fellow human beings, and we come to care deeply about every one of them.Both my husband and I are professors, and we both plan to use the book in our classes. While he is a classicist, who will use the book in a class about illness and injury, praise and blame, I am a philosopher, and I will use the book in a writing class about confronting moral dilemma. We choose our books carefully, always with an eye to picking texts that our students will love to read, and this book is one that we will use for years, I am quite sure.I give this book my highest recommendation.

Why should you read this book?This is an open honest and raw account of what it feels like to be Doctor. The author re-emphasises the central need for doctors to know who the patient is, before moving on to attempts at diagnosis and treatment recommendations. The author describes the joy of successful professional relationships with patients, as well as the anxiety, fear, guilt and depression that can so easily seep into a clinician. The writing style is simple, the stories are true, the truths are universal.Who should read this book?Obviously Doctors and Medical Students should read this book to remind themselves of why they went into medical practice, as well as to enable them to fight for their patients' best interests. Anyone non clinical involved in managing clinicians and clinical work should read this, to gain insight into what is going on inside those pesky clinicians' lives! Patients and carers can easily see the complexity and human fallibility of ethical Doctors work.How long will it take to read? I think it took me about 6 hours to read this book. I found it fascinating and did not want to put it down.

There are many books, there are many good books, ant this one of these good and emotional booksWhen one (as a doctor) reads this book feels that Danielle not only knows well what doctors feel, but also how doctors feel.A must read for doctors