Veterinary School— the Holy Grail and brass ring for animal lovers the world over. An ex K-9 cop, a standardbred harness racer and a Brooklyn-born beauty queen walk into a bar... Add a rabbi, an Olympic gymnast, a loudmouth jerk, and a rough-hewn commercial fisherman from Maine and it must be Friday Night Happy Hour at the School of Veterinary Medicine. Come along with Jack, Hoss, Kerri and the other first-year students of the Death Row Crew as they navigate the irreverent, malodorous, dem...

John Burley's The Absence of Mercy is a harrowing tale of suspense involving a brutal murder and dark secrets that lie beneath the surface of a placid, tight-knit Midwestern town.When a brutally murdered teenager is discovered in the woods surrounding a small Ohio town, Dr. Ben Stevenson—the town's medical examiner—must decide if he's willing to put his family's life in danger to uncover the truth. Finding himself pulled deeper into an investigation with devastating conseq...

This book is a collection of my all-time favorite stories from working with patients as a medical professional over the past seventeen years. I have witnessed and been a part of some amazing experiences ranging from hilarious to shocking to just plain disgusting. I've told these stories many times at family gatherings, parties, and in conversations with friends. After much encouragement, I took the time to write them down before they became distant memories. Each chapter of this book is de...

An inspiring, surprising, sometimes shocking, and ultimately deeply informative memoir of the high-stakes, high-pressured life of a female heart surgeonDr. Kathy Magliato is one of the few female heart surgeons practicing in the world today. She is also a member of an even more exclusive group—those surgeons specially trained to perform heart transplants. Heart Matters is the story of the making of a surgeon who is also a wife and mother. In this powerful and moving memoir...

As the healthcare debate rages on with the growth of the HMO industry, nurses quietly continue to provide the day-to-day grit and deeply-felt passion that hold the healing profession together. Within these remarkable women and men are poignant, outrageous stories drawn from the edge of life. But fear of career backlash and reprisals have made them reluctant to talk to outsiders about their experience. Now Echo Heron, New York Times bestselling author of Intensive Care, draws truths far str...

Tilda Shalof had been taking care of critically ill patients in an intensive care unit for more than twenty-five years, but taking care of herself had never been a priority. That is, until she could no longer ignore her extreme fatigue, shortness of breath, and crushing chest pains. When the results came in, it was time to face the music: Tilda required immediate open-heart surgery to replace a defective valve and to repair damage done to this vital organ.Tilda’s story takes reader...

When I mention that I work in an emergency room, people usually say,Are you a nurse?Wow. That must be really hard.What's it like?This is what it's like to be an emergency doctor.That teenager puking up two liters of vodka and his stomach lining at triage? Yup. Blood pouring out of a terrified pregnant woman? Call me. And, of course, the patient who no longer has a nosebleed screaming at me across the depart...

Fresh out of veterinary college, Dr. Dave Perrin has been in practice for two days in the Creston Valley, and already he's found trouble. He has encountered William, the aggressive billy goat, and Theo, the intrepid Doberman. Don't Turn Your Back in the Barn focuses on the humorous incidents that inevitably happen in a rural practice that treats cows in the morning and kittens in the afternoon. He relies on Doris, his steadfast assistant, to help him in the surgery and to organize the dayb...

Drawing from real medical journal cases, a doctor shares true stories about strange symptoms and perplexing patients.Those in the medical profession know that sometimes the cases that come into emergency rooms or doctor's offices can be highly unusual—and depending on how things go, the results can be either tragic or comic. This collection of stories reveals some of the oddest and most memorable case histories, from the woman who claims she was brushing her teeth ...

Furiously Happy meets Elaine Lui in this truly original—and surprisingly hilarious—memoir about one woman’s journey to learn how to walk after a debilitating diagnosis turned her life upside down.Learn How to Walk (Again) To-Do List:Step 1: StandStep 2: StepStep 3: Pee (Yes!)Step 4: Walk with walkerStep 5: Walk with stick...

"She goes a long way with her book to prove that humor is the best -- possibly the only -- way to keep the world on an even keel."CHICAGO SUN-TIMESRemember the things Mother used to say? Erma Bombeck remembers them all and now she's using them on her own kids! With clever illustrations by Bil Keane, these really funny, too-true observations on family and kids and why it shouldn't work but does, is a wonderful antitdote to the daily problems and crises that every family faces....

To be a good nurse takes dedication, perseverance and patience.We are there to take care of the sick and nurture them back to good health.So what would you say to a little old man who asks you to squeeze his banana?Would you take him up on his offer?I would say, Let me have it.By the way, he only wants it peeled!It is questions like that, that are not that unusual coming from the patients that I care for everyday and some questions get much more creative, if you know what I mean?It...