Synopses & Reviews
An inspiring and profoundly enlightening exploration of one doctors discovery of how hope can change
the course of illness
Since the time of the ancient Greeks, human beings have believed that hope is essential to life. Now, in this groundbreaking book, Harvard Medical School professor and New Yorker staff writer Jerome Groopman shows us why.
The search for hope is most urgent at the patients bedside. The Anatomy of Hope takes us there, bringing us into the lives of people at pivotal moments when they reach for and find hope--or when it eludes their grasp. Through these intimate portraits, we learn how to distinguish true hope from false, why some people feel they are undeserving of it, and whether we should ever abandon our search.
Can hope contribute to recovery by changing physical well-being? To answer this hotly debated question, Groopman embarked on an investigative journey to cutting-edge laboratories where researchers are unraveling an authentic biology of hope. There he finds a scientific basis for understanding the role of this vital emotion in the outcome of illness.
Here is a book that offers a new way of thinking about hope, with a message for all readers, not only patients and their families. "We are just beginning to appreciate hopes reach," Groopman writes, "and have not defined its limits. I see hope as the very heart of healing."
Review
"[E]loquent....[A] cogent, intriguing, hopeful volume." Donna Chavez, Booklist
Review
"Groopman writes with profound compassion....It will undoubtedly save many other patients and their families. In body and in spirit." Judith Warner, The Washington Post
Review
"A thoughtful message, movingly yet unsentimentally presented by a physician alert to medicine's human as well as its scientific side." Kirkus Reviews
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"Despite its title, the text contains a satisfyingly gritty realism....[Groopman] finds that hope can begin a domino effect that neither patient nor health provider can predict....Excelling in narrative, The Anatomy of Hope is strongly recommended." Library Journal
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"The Anatomy of Hope sings with compassion and honesty." Anita Diamant, author of The Red Tent
Review
"This book is the guide and the promise that all of us patients and doctors alike have been seeking, in the quest for hope amid the trials and fears of illness." Sherwin B. Nuland, M.D.
Synopsis
Why do some people facing difficult circumstances find and sustain hope, while others do not? And what can we learn from those individuals who held on to hope? How is their example applicable to our own lives? The Anatomy of Hope is a journey of discovery, spanning some 30 years of Dr. Jerome Groopman's clinical practice during which he encountered many extraordinary people who sought to answer these questions. Each chapter builds on the next and illuminates another facet to the anatomy of hope. The book begins from a point of abject ignorance, when the author was a medical student and did not recognize the vital role of hope in patients' lives. It culminates in Groopman's quest to delineate a biology of hope. With appreciation for the human elements of science, Groopman describes how to distinguish true hope from false hope, and how to gain an honest understanding of the reach and limits of this essential emotion.
Synopsis
The search for hope is most urgent at the patient's bedside. The Anatomy of Hope takes us there, bringing us into the lives of people at pivotal moments when they reach for and find hope or when it eludes their grasp. Through these intimate portraits, we learn how to distinguish true hope from false, why some people feel they are undeserving of it, and whether we should ever abandon our search.
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references (p. 217-236) and index.
About the Author
Jerome Groopman, M.D., holds the Dina and Raphael Recanati Chair of Medicine at the Harvard Medical School and is the chief of experimental medicine at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. His research has focused on the basic mechanisms of blood disease, cancer, and AIDS. He is a staff writer in medicine and biology for The New Yorker and is the author of two popular books, The Measure of Our Days and Second Opinions, which were the inspiration for the television series Gideon's Crossing. In 2000 he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. He lives with his wife and three children in Brookline, Massachusetts.
Table of Contents
Introduction: The Anatomy of Hope
A Note from the Author
Ch. 1 Unprepared 3
Ch. 2 False Hope, True Hope 28
Ch. 3 The Right to Hope 58
Ch. 4 Step by Step 82
Ch. 5 Undying Hope 121
Ch. 6 Exiting a Labyrinth of Pain 147
Ch. 7 The Biology of Hope 161
Ch. 8 Deconstructing Hope 191
Conclusion: Lessons Learned 208
Acknowledgments 213
Notes 217
Index 237