Bøger udgivet af Keynote Books, LLC

Reviews "A wonderful book that blends a historical perspective that perfectly captures an earlier era in medicine with a son's loving portrait of his father. An enjoyable read for everyone, medical students and those planning to become physicians will find in Dr. William Stepansky an exemplary and inspiring role model." -- Howard K. Rabinowitz, M.D., Jefferson Medical College, author of Caring for the Country: Family Doctors in Small Rural Towns "To call this simply a biography is like calling Van Gogh's "Bedroom at Arles" an architectural sketch. In learning about the life of Dr. William Stepansky, one of the last of a breed of true general practitioners, we learn much about the enduring possibilities for genuine human healing. In important ways, the author's father represents the doctor we all deserve." -- Daniel Carlat, M.D., Tufts University School of Medicine, author of Unhinged: The Trouble with Psychiatry "A unique and compelling account of mid-twentieth century American medical practice. Paul Stepansky's portrait of his father reminds us of the hurdles in the path of immigrants and minorities of the post-war era who wished to study medicine and the triumphs of one who not only persisted, but also set a standard for medical practice that has all but disappeared in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This book deserves a wide audience of professional and lay readers alike." -- Howard I. Kushner, Ph.D., Emory University, author of A Cursing Brain? The Histories of Tourette Syndrome Product Description In The Last Family Doctor, historian Paul Stepansky tells the moving and uplifting story of his father, William Stepansky, a remarkable family doctor who touched thousands of lives. Beginning in 1953, he provided all that scientific medicine had to offer the small rural communities he served in southeastern Pennsylvania. And he did so with an embracing humanity, an ability to contain the pain, suffering, and anxious concern of others that is integral to the all but lost art of medicine. William Stepansky was born in Kishinev, Rumania in 1922, the child of Russian Jews who fled the Pogroms that followed World War I. The "making of a doctor," as recorded herein, traverses topics far removed from the life experience of contemporary physicians: intensive violin studies, pharmacy education, army engineering training, battlefield surgery in France and Germany, laboratory work in Czechoslovakia, and admission to Jefferson Medical College in 1947, the latter a result of extraordinary perseverance in which the violin, strange as it sounds, played a part. The Last Family Doctor is not only a memoir. It is a unique window into understanding what has happened to primary care medicine in America over the past six decades. Paul Stepansky concludes with a measured assessment of what we have gained, but also what we have lost, in the death of the postwar GP who cared for individuals and their families from birth to death. In so doing, he challenges us to reflect anew on what we need, what we want, and what we can reasonably expect, from our doctors. The first to take up the challenge is the author's brother, David Stepansky, an internist who practices general adult medicine in the very communities served by his father a half century ago. His thoughtful Afterword, which compares his father's medicine with his own, rounds out the compelling story of a quiet hero who in important ways "represents the doctor we all deserve" (Daniel Carlat, M.D.).

Reviews "Elaine Siegel presents us with the fascinating story of her survival as a Jewish child in Nazi Berlin. Full of detail and laced with pungent observations of the adults around her, Siegel's memoir recreates the child's view of, and emotional reactions to, the Nazi coming to power with astuteness and clarity." -- Susannah Heschel, Eli Black Professor of Jewish Studies, Dartmouth College Product Description "We spied on our families, just like the Hitler Youth had exhorted us to do, but not to catch them in the midst of illicit or illegal acts. We had a different purpose: We wanted to keep our grown-ups alive and away from the police. This was not always easy." -- Elaine V. Siegel, from Chaos Unbound In 1925, Charlotte Resca, a German-Jewish girl of 18 years, was so enamored of her handsome German-Protestant fiancé that she followed him to America. There they would would marry and begin a new life. The marriage failed, but not before a daughter, Elaine, was born on December 29, 1928. In the summer of 1931, Charlotte, unaware of the horror soon to unfold, left her husband and returned to Berlin with her two-and-a-half-year-old Jewish daughter. Beautiful and ambitious, she would pursue a career in banking while her child was raised by the grandparents. Young Elaine would bond with her remarkable maternal grandmother, a midwife, herbal healer, and counselor of local renown, and grow up with an odd assortment of friends, neighbors, and relations, Jewish and Gentile, wealthy and impoverished, pro- and anti-Nazi. There is drama in this memoir of a Jewish childhood in Nazi Berlin. The tightening grip of anti-Semitism, the transformation of local ne'er-do-wells into imperious Brownshirts, the marginalization and degradation of shopkeepers and merchants who resisted Nazi blandishments, and the visceral disgust of many Germans for Hitler -- all are woven into a story whose very intimacy captures the largeness of its historical moment. It is especially the young Elaine's clarity of vision -- her keen understanding of what was happening around her and what was required to safeguard herself and "her adults" -- that pulls the reader along in this gripping account of Jewish survival in the eye of the Nazi storm. About the Author Now in retirement in Wayland, MA after a long and distinguished career as both a psychoanalyst and registered dance therapist, Elaine V. Siegel is widely published in both German and English and has lectured extensively in the United States and Europe.

Reviews "As his story unfolds, the reader is comforted in knowing that he must have made it through, because he lived to write about it. But the book is no less riveting.... He writes of the difficulty that even a confident, educated man can have in talking with doctors. He confronted egos, condescension, excuses -- even lies. He ran into odd forms of compassion, such as the physician who instructed his receptionist to return Newman's $10 co-payment, as though the gesture would help compensate a man who just learned he might die soon. He also found doctors who asked about his family, who walked him to the cab stand when he appeared too shaky to move, who followed through with phone calls to get test results more quickly. From all of them, no matter how much he may have wished for a miracle, he never expected one. He wanted only a full version of truth that he could understand." -- Susan Brink, "Los Angeles Times" "Reading Newman's cautionary story will be preventive medicine for the public and should be included in the continuing education of every physician." -- David Gordon, M.D., Professor of Radiology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine "This book should be required reading for all medical students, and could well form the basis for a course entitled 'Being and Finding the Best Doctor'." -- William Silen, M.D., Johnson & Johnson Professor of Surgery, Emeritus, Harvard Medical School Product Description Without any warning, in September, 1999 David Newman was told he had a rare and life-threatening tumor in the base of his skull. At the time, he had three young children and was a psychotherapist in New York with patients of his own. In the compressed space of five weeks, he consulted with leading physicians and surgeons at four major medical centers. The doctors offered drastically differing opinions; several pronounced the tumor inoperable and voiced skepticism about the effectiveness of any nonsurgical treatment. Newman was told to get his affairs in order. But he proved the doctors wrong. "Talking with Doctors" is an absorbing and unsettling story that touches a collective raw nerve about the experience of doctors and medical care when life-threatening illness leads us to subspecialists at major medical centers. And it is a dramatic rendering of major changes in the doctor-patient relationship that have occurred over the past three decades. Probing the nature of medical authority and the grounds of a trusting doctor-patient relationship, Newman illuminates with grace and power what it now means for a patient to participate in life-and-death medical decisions. In the expanded 2nd edition, Newman brings readers up to date on a medical odyssey that did not end with the events recounted in the original edition. It was renewed especially in 2008 when he suffered a recurrence of skull base tumor, this time inoperable, and was forced to a new and perplexing round of talking with doctors as he struggled to clarify his options and ensure his survival. Newman's treacherous journey, filtered through his discerning intellect and fine literary sensibility, is a life-affirming gift to his readers. He is brilliantly self-reflective about a life lived fully yet precariously for 11 years with the aid of doctors and state-of-the-art treatment.