[.ca] The Blood of Strangers: Stories From Emergency Medicine (ISBN 0805065970)

From Amazon.com:
Forget the niceties of plot development and the easy moralizing of the television shows. There's nothing glamorous about a hospital emergency room, that arena where every human flaw and frailty is exposed. Frank Huyler, a physician and poet, offers a sharp view of life-and-death realities. The emergency room, he writes in these affecting vignettes, is a place where the dominant mood is numbness, where doctors and patients alike have seen too much bloodshed and death. As a defensive reaction, Huyler writes, some doctors become addicted to drugs and other pastimes, while others assume arrogant, cavalier, or aloof airs. This is eminently understandable, and Huyler recounts the growing distance in his relationship with patients as "the earlier intimacy I had felt ... began to recede into the task." A fine storyteller, Huyler doesn't shy away from tales in which he comes up short, just as he shakes his head in bemusement at the ways of administrators and chiefs. In one episode, for instance, he writes of treating a comatose patient with aggressive measures under one attending physician's orders, then doing almost nothing under another's instructions. The patient "was gone from the waking world, as nearly dead as a human being can be, lying at the edge but never quite crossing over"--but, amazingly, he survived both his injuries and the conflict between the two doctors. Reminiscent of the surgeon-essayist Richard Seltzer's best work, Huyler's memoirs take readers behind the surgical screen. --Gregory McNamee

Not very well-written:
Dr. Huyler has some interesting stories to tell, but his writing style is very awkward and hard to follow. It does not flow very well. The stories don't seem to have any real ending to them; it's as if he just stops in mid-story and doesn't finish the tale for us. Also there are strange bits of information added occasionally that have nothing to do with the actual story. I felt like he frequently stopped in mid-story, shifted gears, started to tell a completely different tale instead, then stopped that tale just as abruptly to return to the original story, which in turn was ended without being properly finished. It's as if he tries TOO hard to be intellectual or poetic, and the story suffers because of his failed attempts at intellectualism. Being a doctor does not necessarily make someone a good author. Again, the stories themselves were interesting; they simply were not told very well.

How does it feel to be a doctor?:
Huyler reports years of accident and emergency experience, broken down into very short stories - almost snapshots or video-clips. This has two effects: firstly, it imbues the episodes with the sort of frenetic energy that imbues a television ER scene. Secondly, it encourages the reader to gobble them, swallowing scene after scene, perhaps without digesting them fully. This serves to cheapen thought provoking moments into fast-food: quick episodes to read, then discard, and without pausing, move onto the next one. Individually the stories are meaningful - the fight to save the life of a young man, subsequently identified as a murderer; the thrill of curing a tension pneumothorax; the tug of turning-off a life-support machine. Together they form a less substantial whole. In "Prelude" Huyler gives equal space (two short pages) to his experience of his dissection of a donated corpse early in med school as to the furnishings of his rented flat. Some readers will find that their own unfamiliarity may be sufficient to conjure his own imagined images, but for me the sparse details were insufficient. Tell me how you felt; how it affected you; did you sleep that first night; how soon did you fail to notice the foul smell of formaldehyde? I wanted to know more, Dr Huyler - how was it for you? Other critics and readers will find that the paucity of Huyler's prose keeps the episodes fresh and gives them energy. I'm afraid I disagree and see the lack of feeling, of the author's perspective, as a shortcoming. These events have clearly been ones that have left an impression on the author's mind, soul and way of practice. Is the failure to tell us how they made him feel a symptom of the commercialisation of these supposedly true stories into fodder for the blood-thirsty, thrill-hungry masses? Or is it something more: is this the writer's way of keeping the events personal? Of saying, "This happened to me, you don't need to know that I cried"? Huyler's experiences are ones that probably affect most doctors and in that sense are not unique but are presented by medic writers with a different sheen - of blood, sweat, tears or murderous intent - depending on the genre of choice. I cannot deny that the book is well written and well constructed; there is no loose flesh or spare words. Use it as you wish. It does have the frission of ER, and there is no reason to not enjoy the drama. Or use the book mindfully and reflect on your own life experiences, and those to come. For maximum value, I would prescribe no more than one a day.

Cold bloodedness coupled with human insight..:
The mark of an excellent piece of writing is the invisibility of the prose. Picking up a book and stumbling on the words, the phrases, the writing itself, always gets in the way of a good story. A well-written story creates a situation for the reader, where, for the most part, that necessary 'suspension of disbelief' occurs, and you find yourself lost in the world of the tale. It ceases to be merely reading and becomes something else. In Frank Huyler's The Blood of Strangers, the world of the emergency room emerges from the doctor's point of view with such terrifying reality, that putting the book down, taking a break, is utterly necessary to maintain one's own perspective, one's own reality. Huyler doesn't write prose, but conjures windows into another world. This book is a collection of scenes from the emergency room, revealing an aspect of the medicos that a lot of us would rather not know. First year medical students, for example, are assigned a cadaver to mutilate, take apart, to gain first hand knowledge of human anatomy. This the first of numerous hoops that the student of medicine must jump through in their many years of intense training. There is a tacit reason that anatomy is the first course off the rank - it is a test as to whether they have the capacity to objectify the body as mere object, divorce feeling and emotion from the human form itself. Many fail because they lack that 'scientific objectivity' and cannot stomach using a hack saw to open the skull of their subject. It is too close to home. The terrifying aspect of the Blood of Strangers is the objectivity portrayed by Dr. Huyler - he communicates a kind of cold bloodedness coupled with a profound insight and affinity with the human soul. He is at once human and inhuman, insensitive monster and caring priest - but above all, a man doing a job that most of us would rather leave to someone else. Most all the stories told have something to teach us about the profession. Medical doctors and surgeons are a breed apart - it is almost as if they are born to the task, and their power over life and death is profound. In one of the shorter stories, Sugar, a little girl is brought into the ER because she is just 'acting a bit weird'. The father wants to forget the whole thing and take her home, while the mother instinctively perceives something amiss. Dr. Huyler asks all the appropriate questions and comes up with nothing, until he is about to leave the room, he has a second thought: "Is there any chance she might have gotten into someone's medication? Does anyone in the family take medications regularly?" As it turns out, through a process of logical interrogation, it is discovered that the little girl has overdosed on oral hypoglycemics, sugar pills, and would have died if not treated. This particular story is one of the lesser terrifying incidents, but shows us the fragility of the human condition and the vast responsibilty that burdens the medical profession. The Blood of Strangers is a realistic insight into the mind and experience of a doctor. The book is a strange journey for the uninitiated, and a lesson in the utter fragility of human life - something we should never take for granted. This book is highly recommended.

Blood and guts are not poetic!:
If you liked "Chicken Soup for the Soul", you'll love this one for sure; but my own experience working at the ER has taught me that poetry doesn't mesh very well with blood, pain and imminent death situations. I'm glad Dr. Huyler found a way to channel his stress in a positive way, but his somewhat empty prose leaves me quite cold. If you're looking for some good, interesting and serious tales about hospital medicine I recommend you "Extreme remedies" by John Hejinian. In this, his one and only work of fiction, Dr. Hejinian writes a story that reflects the unadorned reality of this exciting but scary world, and even when the novel was first published more than 20 years ago, it's still actual.

A strange journey for the uninitiated.:
The mark of an excellent piece of writing is the invisibility of the prose. Picking up a book and stumbling on the words, the phrases, the writing itself, always gets in the way of a good story. A well-written story creates a situation for the reader, where, for the most part, that necessary 'suspension of disbelief' occurs, and you find yourself lost in the world of the tale. It ceases to be merely reading and becomes something else. In Frank Huyler's The Blood of Strangers, the world of the emergency room emerges from the doctor's point of view with such terrifying reality, that putting the book down, taking a break, is utterly necessary to maintain one's perspective, one's own reality. Huyler doesn't write prose, but conjures windows into another world. This book is a collection of scenes from the ER, revealing an aspect of the medicos that a lot of us would rather not know. First year medical students, for example, are assigned a cadaver to mutilate, take apart, to gain first-hand knowledge of human anatomy. This is the first of many hoops that the medical student must jump through in their many years of intense training. There is a tacit reason why anatomy is the first course off the rank - it is a test as to whether they have the capacity to objectify the body as mere object, divorce feeling and emotion from the human form itself. Many fail because they lack that 'scientific objectivity' and cannot stomach using a hack saw to open the skull of their subject. It is too close to home. The terrifying aspect of The Blood of Strangers is the objectivity portrayed by Dr. Huyler - he communicates a kind of coldbloodedness coupled with a profound insight and affinity with the human soul. He is at once human and inhuman, insensitive monster and caring priest - but above all, a man doing a job that most of would rather leave to someone else. Most all the stories told have something to teach us about the profession. Medical doctors and surgeons are a breed apart - it is almost as if they are born to the task, and their power over life and death is nothing less than astounding. The Blood of Strangers is a realistic insight into the mind and experience of a doctor. The book is a strange journey for the uninitiated, and a lesson in the utter fragility of human life - something we should never take for granted. This book is highly recommended.