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Interviews | June 19, 2009

Dave: IMG Jim Lynch Makes Landscape Art... Out of Text



jimlynchIf Carl Hiaasen set one of his novels on a residential stretch of boundary line between British Columbia and Washington, or if Richard Russo's characters had relatives in the Pacific Northwest, the result might be something like Jim Lynch's Border Songs. Continue »
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    Border Songs

    Jim Lynch

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4 Beaverton Health and Medicine- Neurologic Illness


Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside

by Katrina Firlik

Another Day in the Frontal Lobe: A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside Cover

ISBN13: 9780812973402
ISBN10: 0812973402
Condition: Standard
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Katrina Firlik is a neurosurgeon, one of only two hundred or so women among the alpha males who dominate this high-pressure, high-prestige medical specialty. She is also a superbly gifted writer-witty, insightful, at once deeply humane and refreshingly wry. In Another Day in the Frontal Lobe, Dr. Firlik draws on this rare combination to create a neurosurgeon's Kitchen Confidential-a unique insider's memoir of a fascinating profession.

Neurosurgeons are renowned for their big egos and aggressive self-confidence, and Dr. Firlik confirms that timidity is indeed rare in the field. They're the kids who never lost at musical chairs, she writes. A brain surgeon is not only a highly trained scientist and clinician but also a mechanic who of necessity develops an intimate, hands-on familiarity with the gray matter inside our skulls. It's the balance between cutting-edge medical technology and manual dexterity, between instinct and expertise, that Firlik finds so appealing-and so difficult to master.

Firlik recounts how her background as a surgeon's daughter with a strong stomach and a keen interest in the brain led her to this rarefied specialty, and she describes her challenging, atypical trek from medical student to fully qualified surgeon. Among Firlik's more memorable cases: a young roofer who walked into the hospital with a three-inch-long barbed nail driven into his forehead, the result of an accident with his partner's nail gun, and a sweet little seven-year-old boy whose untreated earache had become a raging, potentially fatal infection of the brain lining.

From OR theatrics to thorny ethical questions, from the surprisingly primitive tools in a neurosurgeon's kit to glimpses of future techniques like the brain lift, Firlik cracks open medicine's most prestigious and secretive specialty. Candid, smart, clear-eyed, and unfailingly engaging, Another Day in the Frontal Lobe is a mesmerizing behind-the-scenes glimpse into a world of incredible competition and incalculable rewards.

From the Hardcover edition.

Synopsis:

This compelling tell-all by a brilliant young doctor cracks open the demanding, fascinating world of brain surgery, doing for the neurosurgeon what "Kitchen Confidential" has done for the professional chef.

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Shoshana, November 24, 2007 (view all comments by Shoshana)
A well-written and easy to follow account of Firlik's training as a neurosurgeon (she was the first woman admitted to her neurosurgery residency). The narrative is more of a gloss plus clinical highlights than a more in-depth account lof her training; it is not especially psychological, though she does highlight the developmental turning points associated with the residency. There is some material, but not much, about the relationships between surgeons (either specific people or categorical groups), but a reasonable amount about what working with different patients has meant to her. Firlik tells a good neurology tale, and I would have liked more of them. Read with "Working in a Very Small Place: The Making of a Neurosurgeon" for another neurosurgery narrative, with "Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science" for another general surgical training narrative, and with "The Scalpel and the Silver Bear: The First Navajo Woman Surgeon Combines Western Medicine and Traditional Healing" and "Forged by the Knife: The Experience of Surgical Residency from the Perspective of a Woman of Color" for women surgeons' accounts with the added aspect of culture and ethnicity.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780812973402
Subtitle:
A Brain Surgeon Exposes Life on the Inside
Author:
Firlik, Katrina
Publisher:
Random House Trade
Subject:
Personal Memoirs
Subject:
Neurology - General
Subject:
Medical - General
Subject:
Surgeons -- United States.
Subject:
Neurosurgeons - United States
Publication Date:
June 2007
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Pages:
271
Dimensions:
7.96x5.47x.63 in. .48 lbs.

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