Faculty Bibliography

KW - Television programs [Television Program] -- Perri Klass ponders the sudden popularity of medical comedies on TV, and compares it to an earlier wave of medical dramas in the 1950s and 1960s. While 'Marcus Welby, M.D.' was serious, 'Doctor, Doctor,' 'Northern Exposure' and 'Doogie Howser, M.D.' take a lighter approach

A short story about the effect fatherhood had on a mystery writer is presented

A woman recalls her experience with trying to keep a four-month-old baby alive. Even though the professionals have all the training that they need, there will be times when all they do is not enough

Perri Klass reviews 'Strangers at the Bedside: A History of How Law and Bioethics Transformed Medical Decision Making' by David J. Rothman

'Strangers at the Bedside' is the story of how the 'responsible people doing the work' were joined, largely against their will, by the lawyers, the bioethicists, the theologians-and the government as well. David S. Rothman, a historian and a professor of social medicine at Columbia, argues that the entrance into medical decision-making of all these non-physicians actually began when the government, and the general public, began to worry about the ethics of medical research. The scrutinizing of human experiments, the discussion of ethical imperatives, the eventual regulation, Rothman claims, led to a similar discourse concerning the agonizing dilemmas of medical treatment-and non-treatment. Overall, Rothman argues, wartime conditions engendered urgency, and a utilitarian ethic that demanded sacrifices from all citizens for the common good-whether or not those citizens were capable of giving what we would now call informed consent. 'The lessons that the medical researchers learned in their first extensive use of human subjects was that ends certainly did justify means; that in wartime the effort to conquer disease entitled them to choose the martyrs to scientific progress.' It was a doctor named Henry Beecher who blew the whistle. In 1966, he published an article in the New England Journal of Medicine, listing 22 instances of published research built on dubious ethics: live cancer cells injected into patients who were told only that they would be receiving 'some cells'; drugs withheld or new drugs tested. The subjects, Rothman points out, included soldiers, charity patients, mentally retarded people and other groups whose ability to consent freely was doubtful

A look at problems that can eat away at a relationship is offered, and counseling strategies are discussed. A couples workshop on sexuality and intimacy is assessed by two marriage counselors

Kawasaki disease, which is a relatively new syndrome, is discussed. The symptoms and one child's treatment for it are discussed

An in-house pediatrician gives a personal account of being in the delivery room when a baby is born with a nuchal cord. This delivery is compared to her own personal deliveries. The emotions experienced in the role of doctor are quite different than in the role of mother

Perri Klass reviews 'Someday,' Andrew H. Malcolm's account of growing up in his family and of his researches into the medical ethics of discontinuing life support, and their juncture at his elderly mother's hospital bed

In 'Someday,' Mr. Malcolm, national affairs correspondent of The Times and the author of 'Unknown America' and 'Final Harvest,' attempts to trace these different themes in his own life and then bring them all to bear on that one moment 'on a trying, sunny autumn afternoon in a dim room on the third floor of a hospital where my mother lay in suspended animation.' He goes back to his childhood, starting with his memories of his mother, and follows his own development as a son and as a child deeply attached to animals but repeatedly wounded by their deaths. A family cat is run over and the child grieves, wonders if the death was somehow his fault; his parents are uncomfortable. 'Mom suggested it was perhaps some other cat; in fact, she was sure of it and I shouldn't think another thing about it.' Then his own beloved dog is hit by a car and killed, and the boy's father tells him: 'He had a good life with us. But you wouldn't want him crawling around here, always in pain, all crippled.' 'Yes, I would. I'd take care of him. Forever,' says the child. The author's great triumph is that he makes his mother real; she does not exist as an ethical abstraction, or simply as a benign and beloved presence in her son's memory. [Andrew H. Malcolm]'s mother is not necessarily likable, not even to her son. He loves her, of course, and she loves him -- but somehow never enough. 'On Mom's birthday,' he writes, 'I sent her a ship-to-shore cable; I just knew she'd be as excited to get it as I was to send it. She said she got it.' When he becomes a reporter, she never reads his stories. Why? Mr. Malcolm shows that one of the plaintive truths of a parent's death is that it wipes out for all time the chance to repair old wounds. However unrealistic it may be, some people go though their adult lives waiting to hear the words of approval their parents never did and never will say. I was puzzled. Several times I had gone out of my way, conversationally, to describe my medical and ethical stories and then probe gently for her feelings about life-prolonging medical treatment. I started the discussions by saying what I would want and then, seemingly as an afterthought, asking her. 'Your father was lucky,' she replied, 'he went quickly.' Or, 'I don't like all those machines.' One evening, she said, 'I don't want to stay past my time.' I gave out a mental sigh. At last some wonderfully clear directions until, later, I realized who was going to be left to figure out whose time it was or wasn't