Attending Children: A Doctor's Education [Hardcover]

Margaret E. Mohrmann (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2005

In a fast-paced, complicated, and ever more dangerous world it is easy to become self-absorbed and consumed with our own problems. There is one place, however, where we put our self-centered concerns aside, and our deep, common humanity is profoundly touched. That place is where sick children dwell. It is no less difficult - and perhaps even more difficult in many ways - for physicians who have chosen to attend to the health and well-being of gravely ill or dying children. Margaret Mohrmann has devoted most of her professional life to them, and in Attending Children she shares the remarkable education those children and their families have given her. Her narratives are both painful and hopeful, tragic and funny, full of remarkable characters and sometimes bizarre families. Mohrmann has sifted through her thirty years as a pediatrician, and with poignancy, humor, and uncompromising honesty, she shares her sometimes stumbling but always deeply caring journey through a land where, sometimes, small hands have to be let go too soon. She introduces us to not only the physical challenges she, her colleagues, and her patients encounter, but the spiritual ones as well. Attending Children is a unique experience as Mohrmann takes the reader on a doctor's rounds over many years to meet the faces and the struggles, the heartaches and the joys of being a pediatrician. In the case of Margaret Mohrmann and her patients, no one could ask for better teachers.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Dr. Mohrmann's stories of her life in pediatric practice are those of a compassionate, caring, and competent pediatrician of the kind we all seek for our children. Her book will inspire medical students, reaffirm the varieties of humane practicies for her colleagues, and reassure parents that humane care is still possible." - Edmund D. Pellegrino, professor emeritus of medicine and medical ethics, Georgetown University; "Masterfully relating stories both early and late in her pediatric work, [Mohrmann] brings the reader to note the contours of lives lived, not merely the manifesting symptoms of a condition. To explain the abstract principle of autonomy to an aspiring practitioner is one thing. To show her what it means charitably and mercifully to attend to patients is another. As a scholar, I will assign this book. As a mother, I hope that those who treat my daughters will read it." - Amy Laura Hall, assistant professor of theological ethics, Duke University Divinity School"

About the Author

Margaret E. Mohrmann is associate professor of religious studies and medical education at the University of Virginia and is the author of Medicine as Ministry: Reflections on Suffering, Ethics, and Hope.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Georgetown University Press (April 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 158901054X
• ISBN-13: 978-1589010543
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,194,903 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Deals with the grit, July 7, 2007

By 

Elizabeth Shouba "Dr. Mommy" (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Attending Children: A Doctor's Education (Hardcover)

I found this book healing. I read it 5-6 years after completing my residency in pediatrics. It brought up many of my emotions from those draining times. We physicians need to do more creative and emotional analysis of our work, and this book is one of those projects.