A Good Read

This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay

I wasn’t overly thrilled to learn that this was my book club’s choice as I thought it was going to be a fairly depressing account of statistics and politics. WRONG - it is a profound account of the life of a junior doctor: the 97 hour weeks; life and death decisions; a constant tsunami of bodily fluids; and how the hospital parking meter earns more than the staff. Those vile people who abuse hospital staff should be made to read this book.

Specialising in obstetrics and gynaecology, Kay’s diaries recorded the highs and lows of his life as an overworked and often overwhelmed young doctor in an overstretched NHS. Scribbled in secret after endless days, sleepless nights and missed weekends, the book provides a no-holds-barred account of his time on the NHS front line. Hilarious, horrifying and heartbreaking, this diary is everything you wanted to know – and more than a few things you didn't – about life on and off the hospital ward.

Most pages have footnotes explaining medical procedures which I found interesting.

There are lots of little anecdotes that made me laugh and cry. Some are cringe worthy, like dealing with people having inserted all manner of  weird objects up their vaginas to improve their sex lives!! And some are amusing like the time Adam and his registrar Hugo were attending a patient who was bleeding profusely. After a few questions Hugo solved it, the patient had been taking St John’s wort. She was astonished to learn that ‘just herbal’ could be bad for you. Hugo replied that apricot stones contain cyanide, some mushrooms are poisonous, and, continued Hugo, there is a plant in my garden that if you simply sat under it for ten minutes you would be dead. Adam later asked what the plant was “Water Lily”, replied Hugo.

Some people may think it irreverent to laugh at another’s misfortune but there are times when laughter is necessary to maintain sanity, and cheaper than therapy.

I have read where Adam has been criticised for being arrogant. Well I suspect that a great many brilliant doctors are, and some of those criticisms could have been borne out of envy. If  a doctor is healing me or saving my life he/she can be as arrogant as they like.

When you read why he left medicine, it’s heartbreaking. He quit after a caesarean section went horribly wrong. When he tried to write up his notes, he cried for an hour. He continued working as a doctor for a while without laughing, he recalls. He says he should have had counselling. 

The book is also a portrayal of the shameful way politicians treat the NHS and all those who dedicate their working lives to it.

∼ Be safe and well ∼ 

Polly x