Every Patient Tells a Story: Medical Mysteries and the Art of Diagnosis-Fast Shipping

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A riveting exploration of the most difficult and important part of what doctors do,by Yale School of Medicine physician Dr. Lisa Sanders, author of the monthly NewYork Times Magazine column “Diagnosis,” the inspiration for the hit Fox TV seriesHouse, M.D.

“The experience of being ill can be like waking up in a foreign , as you formerly knew it, is on hold while you travel through this other worldas unknown as it is unexpected. When I see patients in the hospital or in my officewho are suddenly, surprisingly ill, what they really want to know is, ‘What is wrongwith me?’ They want a road map that will help them manage their new ability to give this unnerving and unfamiliar place a name, to know it—on somelevel—restores a measure of control, independent of whether or not that diagnosiscomes attached to a cure. Because, even today, a diagnosis is frequently all a gooddoctor has to offer.”

A healthy young man suddenly loses his memory—making him unableto remember the events of each passing hour. Two patients diagnosed with Lyme diseaseimprove after antibiotic treatment—only to have their symptoms mysteriously return.A young woman lies dying in the ICU—bleeding, jaundiced, incoherent—and none of herdoctors know what is killing her. In Every Patient Tells a Story, Dr. Lisa Sanderstakes us bedside to witness the process of solving these and other diagnostic dilemmas,providing a firsthand account of the expertise and intuition that lead a doctor tomake the right diagnosis.

Never in human history have doctors had the knowledge,the tools, and the skills that they have today to diagnose illness and disease. Andyet mistakes are made, diagnoses missed, symptoms or tests misunderstood. In thishigh-tech world of modern medicine, Sanders shows us that knowledge, while essential,is not sufficient to unravel the complexities of illness. She presents an unflinchinglook inside the detective story that marks nearly every illness—the diagnosis—revealingthe combination of uncertainty and intrigue that doctors face when confronting patientswho are sick or dying. Through dramatic stories of patients with baffling symptoms,Sanders portrays the absolute necessity and surprising difficulties of getting thepatient’s story, the challenges of the physical exam, the pitfalls of doctor-to-doctorcommunication, the vagaries of tests, and the near calamity of diagnostic Every Patient Tells a Story, Dr. Sanders chronicles the real-life drama of doctorssolving these difficult medical mysteries that not only illustrate the art and scienceof diagnosis, but often save the patients’ lives.