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In the wake of NHS reforms and such there was an article some time last year about the famous neurosurgeon Dr Henry Marsh and his opinion of the prime minister's NHS policy. Needless to say it wasn't a very high opinion. Essentially, he accused the prime minister of having no vision and warned that this might lead to a permanent revolution of the NHS. Well, from his mouth to God's ears, we have all witnessed the NHS in turmoil over the course of the year. The article also quoted that the prime minister had been moved to tears after reading a memoir published by Mr Marsh the previous year. This memoir is titled ‘Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery’
This book is an account of his life as a neurosurgeon in a busy and modern hospital in London. I usually don’t enjoy reading real life stories because I feel like there usually isn’t enough escapism to allow me to get lost in the story. So this book is in fact one of its kind in my collection of novels. And boy, am I glad I bought it! The book definitely lived up to the hype. If you’re thinking ‘Oh no, this is going to be like Grey’s Anatomy right?’, I’ll have to say ‘wrong!’. Go read it. It is five star rated on the popular online retailer with over a thousand reviews and you won’t be disappointed. You’ll be turning the pages like you wouldn’t believe it.
The book offers incredible insight into the life of a neurosurgeon and exposes the, sometimes unrealistic, expectations that patients have of their surgeons. For example, patients usually think doctors know absolutely everything about their condition as if having total understanding of the disease will give them total control of the situation. Obviously this is never the case. No matter how skilled or distinguished a surgeon is, he or she won’t be able to foresee certain things. For example, that an aneurysm applicator will malfunction during surgery and cause irreparable damage.
There’s also a little reflection on the pre-modern NHS where medics didn’t count their hours but just went on with the job at hand. However now, a patient who has been starved for 6 hours in preparation for surgery might end up not having the surgery on that day because the surgeon in question had already clocked in their daily quota of hours. Meaning that, said patient will have to go through the same ordeal the next day. It makes you wonder where all the money we keep pouring into the NHS is going. Oh yeah, that’s right. Maybe it is going to the thousands of Pounds worth of single use equipment which is disposed of after every surgery. Or maybe it is going to the incessant red tape and over-governance which has been introduced by the government.
A most surprising and unexpected factor that was covered in this book, from the neurosurgeon’s perspective, is thee different ways in which atheists and Christians react to the death of a loved one. Despite its action packed pages full of drama and intrigue, this book definitely taught me; my problems are so small compared to what most people are going through day by day. I cannot imagine suffering excruciating pain on one side of my face similar to having a hot knife pushed into my face, neither can I imagine becoming suicidal because I have OCD and can’t stop washing my hands. These prospects may seem ludicrous but it is the everyday reality for certain people.
A caveat emptor though, if you are very squeamish this might not be the book for you. In certain places he goes into gory details such as pulling someone’s scalp over their forehead and folding it over their face or plastic bags full of severed human hands in various stages of dissection.
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