God's Hotel
A Doctor, a Hospital, and a Pilgrimage to the Heart of Medicine
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Narrated by:
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Victoria Sweet
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By:
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Victoria Sweet
About this listen
San Francisco's Laguna Honda Hospital is the last almshouse in the country, a descendant of the Hôtel-Dieu (God's hotel) that cared for the sick in the Middle Ages. Ballet dancers and rock musicians, professors and thieves - "anyone who had fallen, or, often, leapt, onto hard times" and needed extended medical care - ended up here. So did Victoria Sweet, who came for two months and stayed for 20 years.
Laguna Honda, lower-tech but human-paced, gave Sweet the opportunity to practice a kind of attentive medicine that has almost vanished. Gradually, the place transformed the way she understood her work. Alongside the modern view of the body as a machine to be fixed, her extraordinary patients evoked an older idea of the body as a garden to be tended.
God's Hotel tells their story and the story of the hospital itself, which, as efficiency experts, politicians, and architects descended, determined to turn it into a modern "health care facility", revealed its own surprising truths about the essence, cost, and value of caring for body and soul.
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At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated.
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Phenomenal book!
- By A. Potter on 01-16-16
By: Paul Kalanithi, and others
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Changing the Way We Die
- Compassionate End-of-Life Care and the Hospice Movement
- By: Sheila Himmel, Fran Smith
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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There’s a quiet revolution happening in the way we die. More than 1.5 million Americans a year die in hospice care - nearly 44 percent of all deaths - and a vast industry has sprung up to meet the growing demand. Once viewed as a New Age indulgence, hospice is now a $14 billion business and one of the most successful segments in health care. Changing the Way We Die, by award-winning journalists Fran Smith and Sheila Himmel, is the first book to take a broad, penetrating look at the hospice landscape.
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Sadly, not very engaging.
- By Debra S. Long on 06-16-18
By: Sheila Himmel, and others
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Patient Care
- Death and Life in the Emergency Room
- By: Paul Seward MD
- Narrated by: Jim Seybert
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Recalling remarkable cases - and people - from a career launched in the first days of Emergency Medicine, Dr. Paul Seward leads us in his memoir through suspenseful diagnoses and explorations of anatomy. Within the conditions of great stress and rapid decision-making that are routine in the ER, Dr. Seward tells us that medical staff must be more than technicians of the body: They must be restorers of the human.
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very enjoyable
- By Patricia Oxenham on 03-21-19
By: Paul Seward MD
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Forever Ours
- Real Stories of Immortality and Living from a Forensic Pathologist
- By: Janis Amatuzio
- Narrated by: Janis Amatuzio
- Length: 3 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Forensic pathologist Janis Amatuzio first began recording the stories told to her by patients, police officers, and other doctors because she felt that no one spoke for the dead. She believed the real experience of death, namely the spiritual and otherworldly experiences of those near death and their loved ones, was ignored by the medical professionals, who thought of death as simply the cessation of breath. She knew there was more.
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Forever Ours
- By Londa on 01-04-06
By: Janis Amatuzio
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Rise and Shine
- The Path to Life
- By: Simon Lewis
- Narrated by: Kelsey Grammer
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Crushed between a truck and a tree, Simon and his wife were both pronounced dead at the scene of a horrific car accident. Enduring a broken skull, jaw, arms, clavicle and pelvis, followed by a coma, Simon lives to tell his remarkable journey from tragedy to triumph.
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Amazing opportunities for healing!
- By Leah on 04-29-17
By: Simon Lewis
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The Second Opinion
- By: Michael Palmer
- Narrated by: Franette Liebow
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Here, Michael Palmer has created a cat-and-mouse game where one woman must confront a conspiracy of doctors to uncover an evil practice that touches every single person who ever has a medical test. With unforgettable characters and twists and betrayals that come from the most unlikely places, The Second Opinion will keep you guessing...and looking over your shoulder.
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great story line; unnecessary love affair
- By Anonymous User on 05-26-09
By: Michael Palmer
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Confessions of a GP
- By: Benjamin Daniels
- Narrated by: Eamonn Riley
- Length: 6 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Benjamin Daniels is angry. He is frustrated, confused, baffled and, quite frequently, very funny. He is also a GP. These are his confessions.A woman troubled by pornographic dreams about Tom Jones. An 80-year-old man who can't remember why he's come to see the doctor.
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Very enjoyable
- By PCF on 05-27-17
By: Benjamin Daniels
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The Family Gene
- A Mission to Turn My Deadly Inheritance into a Hopeful Future
- By: Joselin Linder
- Narrated by: Khristine Hvam
- Length: 7 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
When Joselin Linder was in her 20s, her legs started to swell. She thought little of it until her health problems started to compound in ways that baffled her doctors. Diagnosed with extreme liver blockage and dangerous levels of lymph fluid, Joselin turned to the most similar case she could think of - her father's.
By: Joselin Linder
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Advice for Future Corpses (and Those Who Love Them)
- A Practical Perspective on Death and Dying
- By: Sallie Tisdale
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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You get ready to die the way you get ready for a trip. Start by realizing you don't know the way. Listen to a few travel guides. Study the language, look at maps, gather equipment. Let yourself imagine what it will be like. Pack your bags. This book is one of those travel guides - a guide to preparing for your own death and the deaths of people close to you. The fact of death is hard to believe. Sallie Tisdale explores our fears and all the ways death and talking about death make us uncomfortable - but she also explores its intimacies and joys.
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I thought I had more time...
- By Alyssa on 09-09-19
By: Sallie Tisdale
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The Good Death
- An Exploration of Dying in America
- By: Ann Neumann
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren
- Length: 8 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Following the death of her father, journalist and hospice volunteer Ann Neumann sets out to examine what it means to die well in the United States. When Ann Neumann's father was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, she left her job and moved back to her hometown of Lancaster, Pennsylvania. She became his full-time caregiver - cooking, cleaning, and administering medications. When her father died, she was undone by the experience, by grief and the visceral quality of dying.
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Ugh, so boring
- By Maranto on 05-13-19
By: Ann Neumann
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Confessions of a Surgeon
- The Good, the Bad, and the Complicated...Life Behind the O.R. Doors
- By: Paul A. Ruggieri MD
- Narrated by: Eric Martin
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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As an active surgeon and former department chairman, Dr. Paul A. Ruggieri has seen the good, the bad, and the ugly of his profession. In Confessions of a Surgeon, he pushes open the doors of the OR and reveals the inscrutable place where lives are improved, saved, and sometimes lost. He shares the successes, failures, remarkable advances, and camaraderie that make it exciting.
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Enjoyed the anecdotes!
- By suzanne on 07-31-17
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A Great Book
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Finding one's calling is not just about finding something we can do - it is about finding what we can't not do. "Let your life speak" is a time-honored Quaker admonition to live one's life as witness to the deepest truths one knows. But as Parker Palmer explains, those words can also mean "listen to your life, and let it tell you what your truth is."
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What listeners say about God's Hotel
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Melissa
- 07-22-20
Great Book
This touched on so many things humanity is lacking now. The book has spiritual aspects, personal growth, and how time, community, dignity, compassion, and a little care goes a long way. I would love to see a reoccurrence of such care.
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- Carolyn Philpot
- 06-05-21
Bravo 👏 👏👏
An excellent book. Very well written. Not many people think about how hospitals became established and managed. This gives insight. Shows passion. Would recommend to those in the medical profession. Nurses would especially enjoy but recommend for all.
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- Anonymous User
- 06-14-18
a lot of insight and promotes introspection
Great point of view when considering the current situation with health care. all hospital admin, nurses, and docs should read.
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- christina
- 11-07-21
Such a rich story.
A reminder of what medicine was and the now titled Healthcare is. the reader has a warm and inviting voice.
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- Happy Mom
- 08-19-17
Great story, though preferred a different narrator
Great story, though preferred a different narrator. Took me back through years of my own training and experience.
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1 person found this helpful
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- HamReader
- 06-08-19
Medicine from a different time
Enjoyed reading this book about medicine practiced in a different setting and atmosphere than most is done now. The "corporate" world of modern American medicine no longer leaves time for review, contemplation, interaction over time as it did here. We've lost something.
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- DocDenver
- 06-27-16
One of my favorite books!
This book was recommended to me by another doctor, and I absolutely loved it. It kind of caught me by surprise, the narrator seems a bit slow and monotone at first, but the lilting, calm really works. It's got great medical stories, observations on administration in medicine, spirituality, franticness, peacefulness, and just about every other part of an intellectual doctor's journey. Very apropos to current changes in healthcare and some deep questions about what medicine means, and what really do we do for patients? It was fairly long, but had so many different parts that it was like watching a TV series with lots of different episodes. Really bummed when it was over. Highly recommended.
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- Jonelle
- 08-11-14
Absolutely fascinating memoir
Absolutely fascinating memoir and portrait of Victoria Sweet's work as a physician at San Francisco's Laguna Honda Hospital as it struggled to move toward a 21st century model of care for those who can least afford it. I'd live to have her as my physician. ..and I'd love to meet her someday. Highly recommended.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Jean-Anne Taormina
- 08-05-16
Loved the content
Great book with interesting information and stories
The way the author reads the book is how someone would read to a small child. What happened to the normal speaking voice. It was so grating to me at times I thought I would not be able to listen to the end
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2 people found this helpful
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- rfi123158
- 06-01-19
Outstanding book.
this was a perfect book. It wasn't too long, it wasn't too short, it gave you just enough to keep you hungry. when you were finished you realize you were on your own spiritual pilgrimage.
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1 person found this helpful