读 ' Do No Harm' 有感

今年失眠比较多, 睡不好自然没心情做太多的事, 有时累极了也吃半片安眠药, 睡到快要上班时才起来, 所以运动也减少了些.

睡不好就没有做吃的心情, 上班时用花生酱涂面包夹黄瓜夹香蕉应付竟然觉得蛮香, 用各种不同的菜刨丝后凉拌吃起来也特别爽口, 简单营养健康.

因为睡不好看了不少书, 基本不到一周就看完一本. 2个平板同时下载了4本书, 交替着看, 有时从一本跳到第二本连人物都会搞错:)

昨晚看完了英国脑外科医生Henry Marsh 写的" Do no harm", 书中描写了他成长的经历, 从医学生到脑科专家的历史, 30多年手术的成功和错误, 还写了很多脑外科疾病的治疗手术过程及病人和家属的反应等.

我很喜欢 Marsh 医生, 他非常诚实, 书里很多次他描写了在治疗病人时犯的错误, 被病人家属投诉吃官司的过程. 他说, 医生是人不是上帝, 没有医生不犯错的, 尤其在刚开始行医的时候, 他们就是用病人的身体练手艺, 诊断错误, 用药错误, 手术错误等等. 他说, 太多的医生不愿意承认自己犯的错误, 很多医生为了不吃官司在写的手术记录里做手脚掩盖事实, 因为没有人会知道手术中发生了什么, 病人出了状况都可以推到手术前讲过的并发症做借口, 医生诊断错了用药错了也不会给病人和家属交代事实. 他坦然承认年轻时的狂傲, 成年后的随和. 最可贵的是当他的手术失败了(比如为了多切掉一些肿瘤病人术中出血太多导致中风昏迷)他会跟病人和家属道歉, 有时他会鼓励他们打官司, 他说一些并发症对医生来说就是1-5%的几率, 但对手术的病人来说是100%的不幸. 他20多年主动去乌克兰给脑外科病人看病做手术, 培训他们的医生, 还免费带一些病人到英国做手术.

医院做久了自然什么都看到听到过, 记得刚毕业时, 听到手术室的人传出笑话, 某医生给病人做手术, 边做边说, 怎么这么臭啊, 助手说腹腔有大便呢, 他赶紧清洗找不小心划开的大肠, 医院的人把这当笑话传, 可怜的病人怎么知道手术中发生了什么呢?

看完这本书的第二感想是, 身体健康比什么都重要. 吃的健康营养,  锻炼好身体, 尽量不让自己得不该得的病, 不住院不做手术. 至于癌症, 没有人能防的了, 照现代医学的说法, 得了就是倒霉 "bad luck", 基因变异防不胜防.

抄来几个书中的经典语言:

Life without hope is hopelessly difficult but at the end hope can so easily make fools of us all.

Neuroscience tells us that it is highly improbable that we have souls, as everything we think and feel is no more or no less than the electrochemical chatter of our nerve cells. Our sense of self, our feelings and our thoughts, our love for others, our hopes and ambitions, our hates and fears all die when our brains die.

Healthy people, I have concluded, including myself, do not understand how everything changes once you have been diagnosed with a fatal illness. How you cling to hope, however false, however slight, and how reluctant most doctors are to deprive patients of that fragile beam of light in so much darkness.

Some of my operations are great triumphs and tremendous. But they're only triumphs because there are also disasters

Psychological research has shown that the most reliable route to personal happiness is to make others happy. I have made many patients very happy with successful operations but there have been many terrible failures and most neurosurgeons’ lives are punctuated by periods of deep despair.