
Open Heart
A Cardiac Surgeon's Stories of Life and Death on the Operating Table
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Narrated by:
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Gordon Griffin
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By:
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Stephen Westaby
In gripping prose, one of the world's leading cardiac surgeons lays bare both the wonder and the horror of a life spent a heartbeat away from death.
When Stephen Westaby witnessed a patient die on the table during open-heart surgery for the first time, he was struck by the quiet, determined way the surgeons walked away. As he soon understood, this detachment is a crucial survival strategy in a profession where death is only a heartbeat away. In Open Heart, Westaby reflects on over 11,000 surgeries, showing us why the procedures have never become routine and will never be. With astonishing compassion, he recounts harrowing and sometimes hopeful stories from his operating room: We meet a pulseless man who lives with an electric heart pump, an expecting mother who refuses surgery unless the doctors let her pregnancy reach full term, and a baby who gets a heart transplant - only to die once it's in place. For fans of Atul Gawande's Being Mortal and of Henry Marsh's Do No Harm, Open Heart offers a soul-baring account of a life spent in constant confrontation with death.
©2017 Steve Westaby (P)2017 Hachette AudioListeners also enjoyed...




















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Great book
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Practicing EP
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Riviting masterful storytelling
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exciting read if you work in cardiology
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Candid and informative memoir well told
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Fascinating book
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Tamim
Open Heart from the heart!
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It held my interest because this particular heart surgeon was like no other I have read about, as I believe he believed in God and the randomness of life itself.
Surgeons are no better than Flytiers
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What made the experience of listening to Open Heart the most enjoyable?
All the struggles that Dr. Westaby had to overcome, not just the operation, medical side, but also the emotional side.Who was your favorite character and why?
Dr. Westaby himself of course, because of his unerring determination to find either a solution or try as best as possible.Which character – as performed by Gordon Griffin – was your favorite?
This is a strange question because it's not a book of fiction where the narrator plays many characters simultaneously but a biography or choice diaries type.Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
At the beginning of the book, about the story of how Dr. Westaby was inspired to become a surgeon was very touching, while the interviews he went through to get to medical sort certainly earned a good chuckle at the very least.Any additional comments?
After listening to this book, it made me concerned about how medical practices are still so heavily dependent on a doctor's experience, epiphany and luck rather than exacting scientific methods sometimes.Science or luck?
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As the narrator was detailing certain procedures, I’d start to wonder about some item or small detail, and BAM! The answer would be there for me!
I thoroughly enjoyed this.... now, I have to find out what else Mr Westaby May have written. ( In England, surgeons are not called doctors, they are called, Mister.
The different pronunciation of some of our anatomical parts and procedures was interesting. The narrator was great, and kept the spirit of the stories clipping along.
Oh, my! I miss my work so badly!
Spectacular!
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