Editorial Review:

"A powerful, true story of life and death in a major metropolitan hospital...Harrowing... An important book."
THE NEW YORK TIMES
What is life worth? And what is a life worth living? At a time when America faces vital choices about the future of its health care, former NEW YORK TIMES correspondent Lisa Belkin takes a powerful and poignant look at the inner workings of Hermann Hospital in Houston, Texas, telling the remarkable, real-life stories of the doctors, patients, families, and hospital administrators who must ask--and ultimately answer--the most profound and heart-rendng questions about life and death.

Customer Reviews:

Avg. Customer Rating: 5.0 / 5.0

The humanity of doctors in an often inhumane field:

Author Lisa Belkin did her research, in this riveting book. Many who enter the field of medicine do care about helping people; doctors do care about their patients and are frustrated by health insurance, legal concerns and concerns for the patient and their families.
Based in a hospital in Houston, where Belkin did her research, you will not put down this book.
You will feel new empathy for doctors who agonize over the end of life issues with patients and their families.

Good read:

I enjoyed the book. Makes you think about ethics a bit and the reality of financial constraints on the practice of medicine.

Great Material:

This book will keep you wanting to turn the page and make it hard to put down the book. This is a great explanation of real life situations that patients and hospitals face everyday. Some of the situations that are hard for some people to understand why hospitals are concerned with matters like money and certain treatments of patients can be explained.

Inside Texas Medical Center...:

Lisa Belkin has created an amazing book here - she definitely did her research. The book consists of a few case studies of patients who pose ethical dilemas. Belkin takes you inside meetings of the ethics committee at the hospital, she takes you to the patient's bedside to see what the patient actually wants. Some of the patients she follows are a young kid who has been hospitalized for 15 years with a terminal condition, beating all odds by staying alive that long, several premature babies, and a man who... more info

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