Dr. Alla Shapiro was a first responder to the worst nuclear disaster in history -- the explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station in Ukraine on April 26, 1986. First responders were NOT given detailed instructions or protective clothing. Amid an eerie and pervasive silence, Dr. Shapiro treated traumatized children and witnessed frightened families and civilians running barefoot across radioactive grounds and carrying stretchers to save others. First responders triaged and administered first aid, extinguished fires and cleaned up radioactive debris. No protocols were in place since no one considered the possibility of a nuclear accident. From the outset of the disaster the Soviet government worsen matters by spreading misinformation. First-responders were ordered to be part of the deception of the public. This bureaucratic cover-up during angered and disheartened Dr. Shapiro. This painful experience along with the decades of persistent professional and personal discrimination and hostility that she and her family, as Jewish citizens of the USSR, endured, led her and her family like thousands of others to leave and flee the oppressive Soviet Union in the late 1980s. As Émigrés they were restricted to taking possessions weighing no more than 40 pounds and $90 in cash. Their escape route took them first to Vienna and then on to Italy for six months. By then four generations of Dr. Shapiro's family were among these "stateless" people. Chernobyl changed Dr. Shapiro's life and career forever. Arriving in the U.S., like all immigrants she had to learn a new language, encountered red tape validating her diplomas, and find housing for her family When U.S. authorities failed to fully validate her medical diplomas, she re-enrolled in medical school at Georgetown University and restarted her career and new life in America. Spurred on by her Chernobyl experiences, she rose to become one of the world's leading expert's in medical countermeasures against radiation exposure. For thirty years she worked for the FDA on disaster readiness and preparation-and has a much to say about America's readiness or lack of readiness for the current pandemic affecting the United States and the world.

In turn heartbreaking, irreverent, moving—and at times raucously humorous—one of the nation's leading pediatric researchers recounts his first years as a newly minted, stuggling, and insecure doctor at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. A graduate of a state university medical school, Scott Rivkees was competing with elite students from some of the most prestigious schools in the country. Nervous and uncertain, he worked unholy hours with patients ranging from indigent street people to celebrity guests drawn to the reputation and care offered by Mass General. Along the way he learned what medical school textbooks don't teach: how to deal with immense pressure, exhaustion, unruly patients, mysterious conditions, the joy of saving a life, and the wrenching suddenness of losing a patient, more often than not a young child. His resident education did not prevent him from losing his sense of irony and humor as he recounts bleary nights on the town, the allure of young nurses, substandard housing, and the value of pricking an inflated ego.

In The Anatomy of a Calling, Lissa Rankin, MD, makes a simple yet revolutionary claim: We are all, every single one of us, heroes. We are all on what Joseph Campbell calls "a hero's journey;" we are all on a mission to step into our true nature and fulfill the assignment our souls were sent to Earth to fulfill. Navigating the hero's journey, Dr. Rankin argues, is one of the cornerstones of living a meaningful, authentic, healthy life. In clear, engaging prose, Dr. Rankin describes her entire spiritual journey for the first time--beginning with what she calls her "perfect storm" of events--and recounts the many transformative experiences that led to a profound awakening of her soul. Through her father's death, her daughter's birth, career victories and failures, and an ongoing struggle to identify as both a doctor and a healer, Dr. Rankin discovers a powerful self-awareness. As she shares her story, she encourages you to find out where you are on your own journey and offers wisdom and inspiration in the form of "Hero's Guideposts" along the way. Dr. Rankin weaves in lessons on trusting intuition, surrendering to love, and learning to see adversity as an opportunity for soul growth. Much more than a memoir, The Anatomy of a Calling guides you to make a powerful shift in consciousness and reach your highest destiny.

"A first-person narrative that takes readers inside the medical profession as one doctor solves real-life medical mysteries"--Provided by publisher.

Revere life, and give yours away for the sake of serving others. As a young man, Albert Schweitzer seemed destined for greatness. His immense talent and fortitude propelled him to a place as one of Europe’s most renowned philosophers, theologians, and musicians in the early twentieth century. Yet Schweitzer shocked his contemporaries by forsaking worldly success and embarking on an epic journey into the wilds of French Equatorial Africa, vowing to serve as a lifelong physician to “the least of these” in a mysterious land rife with famine, sickness, and superstition. Enduring hardship, conflict, and personal struggles, he and his beloved wife, Hélène, became French prisoners of war during WWI, and Hélène later battled persistent illnesses. Ken Gire’s page-turning, novelesque narrative sheds new light on Schweitzer’s faith-in-action ethic and his commitment to honor God by celebrating the sacredness of all life. The legacy of this 1952 Nobel Prize honoree endures in the thriving African hospital community that began in a humble chicken coop, in the millions who have drawn inspiration from his example, and in the challenge that emanates from his life story into our day. Albert Schweitzer seemed destined for greatness—and he achieved it by making his life his greatest sermon to a world in desperate need of hope and healing.

Most people have visited a doctor's office or emergency room in their lifetime to gain clarity about an ailment or check in after a procedure. While doctors strive to ensure their patients understand their diagnoses, rarely do those outside the medical community understand the words and phrases we hear practitioners yell across a hospital hallway or murmur to a colleague behind office doors. Doctors and nurses use a kind of secret language, comprised of words unlikely to be found in a medical textbook or heard on television. In The Secret Language of Doctors, Dr. Brian Goldman decodes those code words for the average patient. What does it mean when a patient has the symptoms of "incarceritis"? What are "blocking" and "turfing"? And why do you never want to be diagnosed with a "horrendoma"? Dr. Goldman reveals the meaning behind the colorful and secret expressions doctors use to describe difficult patients, situations, and medical conditions—including those they don't want you to know. Gain profound insight into what doctors really think about patients in this funny and biting examination of modern medical culture.

New York Times Bestseller Finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Biography "Janice P. Nimura has resurrected Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell in all their feisty, thrilling, trailblazing splendor." —Stacy Schiff Elizabeth Blackwell believed from an early age that she was destined for a mission beyond the scope of "ordinary" womanhood. Though the world at first recoiled at the notion of a woman studying medicine, her intelligence and intensity ultimately won her the acceptance of the male medical establishment. In 1849, she became the first woman in America to receive an M.D. She was soon joined in her iconic achievement by her younger sister, Emily, who was actually the more brilliant physician. Exploring the sisters’ allies, enemies, and enduring partnership, Janice P. Nimura presents a story of trial and triumph. Together, the Blackwells founded the New York Infirmary for Indigent Women and Children, the first hospital staffed entirely by women. Both sisters were tenacious and visionary, but their convictions did not always align with the emergence of women’s rights—or with each other. From Bristol, Paris, and Edinburgh to the rising cities of antebellum America, this richly researched new biography celebrates two complicated pioneers who exploded the limits of possibility for women in medicine. As Elizabeth herself predicted, "a hundred years hence, women will not be what they are now."

A compelling and inspiring account, A Thousand Times Yes is the spiritual journey of two doctors who heard and answered God's call. Willing to face danger, reject societal expectations, and live a primitive lifestyle, they experienced God's love as they made a difference in the world and raised five sons.

On Call begins with a newly-minted doctor checking in for her first day of residency--wearing the long white coat of an MD and being called "Doctor" for the first time. Having studied at Yale and Dartmouth, Dr. Emily Transue arrives in Seattle to start her internship in Internal Medicine just after graduating from medical school. This series of loosely interconnected scenes from the author's medical training concludes her residency three years later. During her first week as a student on the medical wards, Dr. Transue watched someone come into the emergency room in cardiac arrest and die. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before-it was a long way from books and labs. So she began to record her experiences as she gained confidence putting her book knowledge to work. The stories focus on the patients Dr. Transue encountered in the hospital, ER and clinic; some are funny and others tragic. They range in scope from brief interactions in the clinic to prolonged relationships during hospitalization. There is a man newly diagnosed with lung cancer who is lyrical about his life on a sunny island far away, and a woman, just released from a breathing machine after nearly dying, who sits up and demands a cup of coffee. Though the book has a great deal of medical content, the focus is more on the stories of the patients' lives and illnesses and the relationships that developed between the patients and the author, and the way both parties grew in the course of these experiences. Along the way, the book describes the life of a resident physician and reflects on the way the medical system treats both its patients and doctors. On Call provides a window into the experience of patients at critical junctures in life and into the author's own experience as a new member of the medical profession.

Get to know the eccentric alien known as the Doctor in this “out-of-this-world read for both Classic and New Who fans” (Library Journal). From his beginnings as a crotchety, anti-heroic scientist in 1963 to his current place in pop culture as the mad and dangerous monster-fighting savior of the universe, the character of Doctor Who has metamorphosed in his many years on television. And yet the questions about him remain the same: Who is he? Why does he act the way he does? What motivates him to fight evil across space and time? The Doctors Are In is a guide to television’s most beloved time traveler from the authors of Who Is the Doctor and Who’s 50. This is a guide to the Doctor himself—who he is in his myriad forms, how he came to be, how he has changed (within the program itself and behind the scenes) . . . and why he’s a hero to millions.