The main theme of “Final Cut” by Atul Gawande is that medicine is an inexact science and doctors are not always sure of themselves, even if they appear confident. Gawande’s main argument is simply stated: there has been a decline in the amount of autopsies performed in the medical field as a result of medical arrogance; over confident doctors believe they know the cause of death and do not want to perform autopsies. Gawande illustrates his argument by outlining the history of autopsy use in medicine, incorporating medical cases that he has experienced as a surgeon, and including statistics on autopsy usage. “Final Cut” is an outstanding profile on the decline of autopsy use in medicine. What makes “Final Cut” an enjoyable and informative article for all readers is its use of strategies associated with fiction such as the establishment of characters, balance between medical information and personal experience, and its use of active voice. It is evident throughout “Final Cut” that Gawande is an author who draws on and adapts elements of fiction such as the establishment of characters and the creation of tension and suspense within his journalism. By incorporating medical cases he has experienced as a surgeon, Gawande is able to establish many characters that the reader develops an emotional connection with. This emotional connection develops because readers are provided with just enough information about the characters to individualize them, allowing readers to care about
Atul Gawande in his article “When the Doctor Makes Mistakes” exposes the mystery, uncertainty and fallibility of medicine in true stories that involve real patients. In a society where attorneys protect hospitals and physicians from zealous trials from clients following medical errors, doctors make mistakes is a testimony that Gawande a representative of other doctors speak openly about failures within the medical fields. In this article, Gawande exposes those errors with an intention of showing the entire society and specifically those within the medicine field that when errors are hidden, learning is squelched and those within the system are provided with an opportunity to continue committing the same errors. What you find when you critically analyse Gawande, “When Doctors Make Mistakes essay is how messy and uncertain medicine turns out to be. Throughout the entire article you experience the havoc within the medicine field as the inexperienced doctor misapplies a central line in a patient.
"Johns Hopkins patient safety experts have calculated that more than 250,000 deaths per year are due to medical error…" (John Hopkins Medicine). This soaring number has caused medical errors to become the third leading cause of death in the United States. For many people, medicine seems foreign and unknown. People who have lost loved ones due to medical error desperately look for a reason, and many times that blame falls upon doctors. Media has put a negative connotation on doctors as well, causing their reputation to plummet whenever a hospital procedure turns badly. A renown surgeon and author, Atul Gawande, uses his knowledge and experience to give people a new perspective on medicine. In the article "When Doctors Make Mistakes," Gawande uses rhetorical appeals: ethos, pathos, and logos to prove the need for a change in the medical systems and procedures. He analyzes how the public looks at doctors, giving a new perspective to enlighten the reader that even the best doctors can make mistakes.
While there are still people who do not believe in the use of cadavers or have no interest in becoming one (which is completely fine as it is simply a matter of opinion), Mary Roach shines light on all the positive impacts that cadavers can have on human life today. From bettering our safety by being used in studies for impact tests, to furthering scientific, medical and forensics research, cadavers are a necessity to our well-being and
Richard Wagamese’ expertise in the realm of story telling unlocks a dream world where he has the ability to accurately portray the protagonist’s emotions directly to the reader. Wagamese is able to flip in between current events and past stories to ultimately immerse the reader into a world of imagination. Additionally, he perfects the order in which these stories are being told. By doing so, it allows the reader to take pity upon the protagonists at hand in an utmost flawless succession. Lastly, through effective and clever story telling, Wagamese is able to engage the reader by placing them in both the shoes and minds of his protagonist. It is the profound ability of story telling Wagemse possesses that allows him to create intriguing protagonists who drive the plot of the novel through the stories told.
According to the Institute of Medicine, “At least 44,000 people, and perhaps as many as 98,000 people, die in hospitals each year as a result of medical errors” (Kohn et al.). Despite the unfortunate consequences, medical errors provide an important foundation for medicine. An immense uncertainty envelopes the medical field, and frequent leaps must be made. Some of these ventures are prosperous; however, many render unsuccessful. In Complications, Atul Gawande crafts an alluring view of the medical unknown using tales of his personal medical mistakes. Through the use of ethos, logos, and pathos, Atul Gawande argues that medicine’s vast uncertainty has beneficial influence upon society.
Deborah Lupton is a sociologist and a research professor at the University of Canberra, Australia. She received bachelor degrees in sociology and anthropology at the Australian National University, as well as a Masters in Public Health and a doctorate from the University of Sydney. She has written 14 books and 130 academic journals on the topics of medicine and public health from a sociological perspective. She is currently researching topics such as sociology in a digital culture and digital health analysis (Lupton, 2012).
A patient is a human being. Illness disturbs biological, social, psychological elements that make the patient human. It is not enough to centre and diagnoses and decisions on scientific data and empirical fact; medicine is about much more. The focus of this paper is to make the argument that the practice of medicine is a discipline that requires human empathy as well as scientific data and empirical fact to establish diagnoses with emphasis on five components of the physician-patient relationship: patient’s experience of illness, physician-patient communication, and proficiency of end of life care, medical ethics and spiritual growth. This position will be supported through the film “Wit (Nichols & Brokaw, 2002)” through the character Vivian Bearing 's revelation that illustrates a patient’s struggle with death and in the process exposes the distinction between medicine and science.
When faced with a tough, and timed emergency situation, there are many directions a heath care provider can go in from there. They can freeze, act improperly, or not quick enough, but some will also act professionally and correctly perhaps saving a patient's life. What determines the direction a health care provider will take is their experience. From knowledge to observation, a medical professional can learn the most efficient ways to work. But one way in particular, past medical experiences and the patient, provider relationship, can influence the decisions a health care provider will make. This can be demonstrated by both Atul Gawande, author of Complications: A Surgeon’s Note on an Imperfect Science, and within Courtney Davis’s The
Gawande even though he followed the correct protocols to care for the patient, he was not paying enough attention to the possible casualties. His actions were correct, yet they were wrong at the same time, this led him to question his own expertise. This shows that
to work with Southam. According to page 130, its states, “...three young Jewish doctors refused,saying they wouldn’t conduct research on patients without their consent.” and then on page 133 Skloot says, “Hyman compared Southam’s study to Nazi research and got affidavits from the three doctors who’d resigned - they described Southam’s research using words like illegal, immoral, and deplorable.” These lines from the text reveal how the doctors felt because of what Southam was doing. Those doctors even resigned and they testified against Southam because they knew what Southam was doing was wrong and they could not stand there and be an accomplice.
The film is important and gives the viewer a chance to experience Gibbon’s work on a personal level. He uses his life experience as material for his films while remaining professional. Even though the film might be viewed as an autobiography, Gibbons introduces extremely personal confessions into it that make it a unique type of psychodrama. A series of events unfolds with Gibbons narrating how he descended to destructive behavior. It is clear that he has had a hard
The practice of medicine has been shaped through the years by advances in the area of diagnostic procedures. Many of these advances were made possible by scientific breakthroughs made before the 20th century. Modern medicine arguably emerged. Both normal and abnormal functions (physiology and pathology) were increasingly understood within smaller units, first the tissues and then the cells. Microscopy also played a key role in the development of bacteriology. Physicians started to use stethoscope as an aid in diagnosing certain diseases and conditions. New ways of diagnosing disease were developed, and surgery emerged as an important branch of medicine. Above all, a combination of science and technology underpinned medical knowledge and
What you hold in your hands is akin to a quite toxic, boundlessly absurd and dubiously plotted episode of Doctor Who.
The complex structure and foreign nature of Tibetan medicine makes it difficult to relate its practices to Western medicine, making it difficult to determine the clinical efficacy of Eastern medical practice. Several clinical analysis studies have recently been performed in order to determine the efficacy of the “holistic” practices of Eastern cultures. Whether the studies show Eastern or Western practices to be more effective, I believe that the most effective treatment should be a combination of both practices.
Mukherjee (2015) talks about the three laws of medicine however these are his personal laws that may or may not be followed by other health professionals. He explains each law that he had learned through personal experiences with patients. The first law is ‘A strong intuition is much more powerful than a weak test,’ explains that there may be some hidden variable when diagnosing a patient that could be crucial in life or death situations. A variable could be the environment that a person lives in or their lifestyle and this chapter notes to know when to look for small clues that could possibly help. The second law is ‘”Normals” teach us rules; “outliers” teach us laws, ' talks about how normal cases teach and build the rules of what should be done on a regular basis of patients, what is normal. Outliers are the cases where it may untreatable but has the chance to reshape and even advance medicine. The third law is 'For every perfect medical experiment, there is a perfect human bias, ' talks about how we hope for a medical treatment that can help treat a disease but it is biased because it either works or doesn’t work despite a few anomalies. These are laws Mukherjee has learned from experience and applies throughout his career, they may not be followed by all health practitioners.