Customer Reviews

Just Here Trying to Save a Few Lives: Tales of Life and Death from the ER

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The ninth circle of hell in this autobiography of emergency room physician Pamela Grim is the South Side of Chicago. When she burns out trying to heal the unceasing stream of addicts, assault victims, and alcoholics who flood into her emergency room, she joins Médecins sans Frontières and descends even further into what might be the modern tenth and eleventh circles of hell: Bosnia in the depths of war and genocide; and Africa during a meningitis epidemic.

Grim, indeed. This is not a book to read if you're already feeling depressed. I thought I wouldn't have a problem with this story because I'd been watching that interesting and horrifying bit of reality T.V. called, "Trauma: Life in the E.R." Now I realize that even though 'Trauma' viewers see everything from surgeons rooting around in a gunshot victim's intestines to ER physicians trying to save an eyeball that has popped out of an accident victim's head, reality T.V. doesn't come close to Dr. Grim's reality.

Some of her saddest cases, in Chicago at least, involve babies born to cocaine-addicted, alcoholic mothers who don't come into contact with a physician until they're giving birth. Babies in America aren't usually born in an emergency room--except when Dr. Grim happens to be moonlighting in a hospital that doesn't have an obstetrician on site, or when the mother is wheeled into ER with two bullets through her brain. In one of the most gruesome episodes in this book, she assists in the birth of an anencephalic baby: "There was a rivulet of fluid, and then this 'thing' slithered out onto the cart..."

Never mind. At least the babies in Chicago don't die of tetanus like they still do in Africa. In her preface to the chapter, "How to Treat Tetanus," Dr. Grim quotes from the Qu' aran:

Also a sign for them is that we bear their progeny on the laden ship. / If we will, we drown them, / and there is no helper for them/ nor are they saved, unless as a mercy from us...

There is very little mercy in this chapter about a Nigerian police officer who dies of a treatable, preventable disease that Dr. Grim never experienced in all of her years in Chicago. She does what she can for the man, scrounging medicine from her meningitis cases, taping "TOUCH THIS IV AND YOU DIE" to the man's IV, even transporting him from the Médecins sans Frontières field clinic to a 'tetanus hospital' ten miles away. The so-called 'hospital' had no medicine, no beds, not even a dark, quiet place for him to die. Some of the author's most poignant musings occur while she is travelling with the dying man. She thinks about the equipment, techniques, and medicine that would have been able to treat this man in America--even on the South Side of Chicago.

This is a profoundly moving book.

While the middle third of this book is interesting, the rest of it is rather dull and depressing. That's not surprising since the author's pilgrimage was precipitated by her melancholy and disappointment with life as an ER physician in America. As an ER doctor, I can certainly sympathize with her discontent, but I am nevertheless shocked that such a glum book was published. Although it is true that any accurate portrayal of ER medicine is bound to include much negativity, Dr. Grim (how utterly apropos, by the way) could have tempered her pervasively gloomy account with an occasional ray of sunshine.

In addition to making readers reach for their Prozac, there's a lot about this book that I didn't like. First, the quality of writing was annoying. Second, I repeatedly had the feeling that her smattering of interesting stories were overly embellished and hence not entirely believable. Third, Dr. Grim leaves readers wondering if she's still working in the ER or is now doing hair transplants. The central question in this book is whether Grim can shake her disaffection with ER medicine and keep working in that field, or whether she decides to accept a job offer from a friend to perform hair transplants and other cosmetic procedures. Fourth, this book is by no means a complete or even passably complete narrative of what it is like to be an ER physician.

After enjoying Dr. Grim's articles in Discover magazine, I couldn't wait to read her debut novel. I was not disappointed. Although graphic and gut wrenching, it's a true page turner. A must read for anyone interested in emergency medicine. This book sheds new light on the real ER and dims my view of the television ER. I look forward to more from Dr. Grim.

This was an excellent book, great material and well written. You could actually put yourself in the authors shoes.

In "Just here trying to save a few lives" Dr. Pamela Grim paints us a vivid picture of life in the ER. As an EMT student I found the book captivating and informative. The book started a little slow but quickly picked up the pace. As we travel with Dr. Grim from hospital to hospital and from country to country we see the struggles and trials that doctors face every day. There was a lot of medical language that, had I not been an EMT student I would have not understood but would still be able to follow the story. Overall this was a very good book and I would recommend it to any one interested in going in to the medical filed or to anyone who is curious of what doctors face in their profession.

I almost didn't buy this book because I disliked the title so much. It turned out, however, to be a gripping and brutally honest account of some of Pamela Grim's experiences in the ER. For a physician to play down her extensive training, knowledge, and ability, and to play up her indecisiveness and even fear, is refreshing. After too many long days, too much sleep-deprivation and repeated exposure to emotionally-shattering situations, that she ended up burnt out is no surprise. That she has the guts to admit how she felt, and the reasons behind her feelings, is admirable.

As a medical student and a former employee of the emergency department, I found this book to be a very realistic, while heartrending account of what actually occurs in the ER. Dr. Grim lays out a beautiful picture of the unseen (to everyday society) tragedies that occur on a daily basis. I loved her writing style and accounts of her overseas ventures. She painted a picture of a Macedonian refugee camp so vivid, I feel like I have been there. I hope that she continues to write. I think medical students, especially those interested in emergency medicine, and others in the medical field will love this book as much as I did.

Being A Med student contemplating a career in Emergency Medicine I thought this book might be an interesting piece to read. However, to my great disappointment I came across a manifest of self pity, depression and psychosocial babble of a bitter, unsatisfied self-righteous doctor. This book contains chapters about the authors experience in the ER which are sometimes interesting but mostly depressing - there is a limit to how many times the author can write about the alcoholic and drug addicts which turn up in the ER before the reader thinks to himself - haven't I been in this chapter before? Other chapters deal with the Author's journeys with medical assistance groups to Nigeria and Bosnia and those chapters as well contain too much of the authors trial to cope with political and social factors she obviously hasn't the slightest clue about (and to her behalf she admits so herself). I'm not saying there aren't any interesting parts in the book - for example her experiences as a new resident, but all in all this book is at the opposite end of the TV series ER - there everything is fast paced and exciting and here everything bleak and dreary. Not a good book for an aspiring Doctor.

If you are a doctor, medical student, or someone interested in life in the ER, you will love this book. It's a collection of short episodes that take place in various ERs during various times in the author's life. They are written in the first person, and as far as I know are true stories. They are reminicent of the TV show ER, but go much deeper into the situations. The language is both medical and in regular language at the same time, which is great. It makes you feel like you are a student standing behind Dr. Grim trying to follow along with the procedures. She has led such an interesting life. The book keeps you rivited, and isn't much of a commitment because for the most part because the stories really aren't linked, so you can read one on a Monday night and another the following Saturday afternoon without having to remember details from Monday. It's full of joy and sorrow, and doesn't have any boring spots. I hope she writes more stuff like this.

Blurbs from the above physician-writers (who are two of my favorite writers, period) grace this book's dustjacket-and with good reason. Dr. Grim's ER tales are fast-paced, clearsighted, and seem to me to be brutally honest and self-reflective. Grim keeps the larger world and its realities in focus as she explores the peculiar microcosm of the ER, which she suggests is similar to what one would find under a large rock amid a beautiful meadow: mud, worms, slugs, and skittering things which race away from the daylight. The previous customer reviewer, another ER doctor, is harshly critical of Grim: s/he seems to be writing from the height of an unwritten memoir! For me, Grim is a compelling realist who perceives and writes vividly and concretely. One will not easily forget the afghan knitting nurse, the Cole-Porter singing cop (who later dies in the ER room), the farmer's wife with the elephant on her chest, Murray the neurotic resident, or the fly-eyed foetus.