Books : Life Support: Three Nurses on the Front Lines
|
|
In association with Amazon.com
|
by: Suzanne Gordon
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 610.73
EAN: 9780316329637
ISBN: 0316329630
Label: Back Bay Books
Manufacturer: Back Bay Books
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 352
Publication Date: May 12, 1998
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Sales Rank: 185182
Studio: Back Bay Books
Related Items:
Editorial Review:
Product Description:
These graphic, humane, and compelling portraits of three remarkable women offer an eye-opening account of the obstacles that nurses face within the medical community today. Critics everywhere have hailed this book as a classic in the making.
Amazon.com Review:
In today's era of high-technology medicine, Suzanne Gordon, editor of books such as Caregiving: Readings in Knowledge, Practice, Ethics, and Politics, brings us the story of three nurses who work to humanize the experience of receiving medical care. We meet Nancy Rumplik, an outpatient nurse in an ambulatory clinic, as she prevents a nearly fatal allergic reaction to a course of chemotherapy. We meet nurse practitioner Ellen Kitchen, who provides home care to an 88-year-old man who does not want surgery for his prostate cancer. And we meet Jeannie Chaisson, a medical clinical nurse specialist, whose work continues after her shift ends as she helps a husband and daughter come to terms with a loved one's desire to stop treatment and succumb to death. Through their accounts Gordon tells us much about the health care system and about the nursing attention that allows people to tolerate the painful treatments and difficult choices that accompany high-technology medicine.
While Life Support draws attention to the often invisible work of nurses, it also highlights their plight in a health care system that increasingly focuses on the bottom line. Gordon painstakingly makes the point that it is not just surgery, ventilators, and dialysis machines that offer life support in the health care system. She shows how these nurses create an environment in which high-technology medicine can thrive, but that is not devoid of human care and concern. We learn how experienced nurses teach their colleagues, smooth over insensitive treatment by doctors, tend to illness, and bring dignity to death when treatment no longer works--all of which are roles that could not necessarily be filled by lower-paid, less-experienced personnel. In chronicling the work of Rumplik, Kitchen, and Chaisson, Gordon brings a story of the soul of America's health care system. --Amy Sessler
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - Great Book
As a nursing student I loved this book. It gave a great perspective on some areas of nursing that nursing students may not be exposed to during clinicals. Toward the end of the book it did get into nursing/hospital politics and policy, which slowed things down. I wish that the author had ended with something better and more inspiring.
Rating: - Powerful
It's often said that in today's society we have no heroes. If you read this book, you will soon learn otherwise.
Rating:  - Great Nursing Book- could do w/o political commentary
I really liked the aspects of this books that dealt with the three nurses performing their jobs in their perspective fields. That was great- but all the talk about nursing jobs getting cut really gets boring after a while. So much so I've been dreading reading the last chapter. Great book, just has some boring parts.
Rating: - Summarizes nursing's role in the current health care arena.
A must read for all those working IN or WITH the profession of nursing. Gordon discusses how the changes in our health care system have affected both the nurses role and quality patient care issues. The essential need for collaboration of all health care personnel is woven throughout the content. I required this book for a senior nursing course I just taught at Wayne State University in Detroit and the students were most impressed with the book and its approach to nursing, medicine and health ... Read More
Rating: - Essential reading for all health care consumers .
The most under rated people in our society are nurses,this is an introduction to the ever present caregivers in healthcare today.The most varied role and most significant in all aspects of health care is the nurse.This was a wonderful read for all of those who may ever be the receiver of any aspect of their care from nurses in our country, basically everyone,a must have.For those considering the profession as a career,and the family members who would like an overview of "all in a days work", this ... Read More
|
|
|
