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Patient H.M.
- A Story of Memory, Madness, and Family Secrets
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 14 hrs and 34 mins
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Publisher's summary
“Oliver Sacks meets Stephen King”* in this propulsive, haunting journey into the life of the most studied human research subject of all time, the amnesic known as Patient H.M. For listeners of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks comes a story that has much to teach us about our relentless pursuit of knowledge.
Winner of the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award
Los Angeles Times Book Prize Winner
Named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post , New York Post, NPR, The Economist, New York, Wired, Kirkus Reviews, BookPage
In 1953, a 27-year-old factory worker named Henry Molaison - who suffered from severe epilepsy - received a radical new version of the then-common lobotomy, targeting the most mysterious structures in the brain. The operation failed to eliminate Henry’s seizures, but it did have an unintended effect: Henry was left profoundly amnesic, unable to create long-term memories. Over the next 60 years, Patient H.M., as Henry was known, became the most studied individual in the history of neuroscience, a human guinea pig who would teach us much of what we know about memory today.
Patient H.M. is, at times, a deeply personal journey. Dittrich’s grandfather was the brilliant, morally complex surgeon who operated on Molaison - and thousands of other patients. The author’s investigation into the dark roots of modern memory science ultimately forces him to confront unsettling secrets in his own family history and to reveal the tragedy that fueled his grandfather’s relentless experimentation - experimentation that would revolutionize our understanding of ourselves.
Dittrich uses the case of Patient H.M. as a starting point for a kaleidoscopic journey, one that moves from the first recorded brain surgeries in ancient Egypt to the cutting-edge laboratories of MIT. He takes listeners inside the old asylums and operating theaters where psychosurgeons, as they called themselves, conducted their human experiments, and behind the scenes of a bitter custody battle over the ownership of the most important brain in the world. Patient H.M. combines the best of biography, memoir, and science journalism to create a haunting, endlessly fascinating story, one that reveals the wondrous and devastating things that can happen when hubris, ambition, and human imperfection collide.
“An exciting, artful blend of family and medical history.” (The New York Times)
* Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
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Critic reviews
"Oliver Sacks meets Stephen King in a piercing study of one of psychiatric medicine's darker hours.... A mesmerizing, maddening story and a model of journalistic investigation." (Kirkus Reviews)
"Patient H.M. tells one of the most fascinating and disturbing stories in the annals of medicine, weaving in ethics, philosophy, a personal saga, the history of neurosurgery, the mysteries of human memory, and an exploration of human ego." (Sheri Fink, MD, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Five Days at Memorial)
“In prose both elegant and intimate, and often thrilling, Patient H.M. is an important book about the wages not of sin but of science. It is deeply reported and surprisingly emotional, at times poignant, at others shocking.... A scintillating book, infused with humanity.” (The Washington Post)
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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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Brainstorm
- Detective Stories from the World of Neurology
- By: Suzanne O'Sullivan
- Narrated by: Christine Williams
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Brainstorm follows the stories of people whose medical diagnoses are so strange even their doctor struggles to know how to solve them. A man who sees cartoon characters running across the room; a girl whose world suddenly seems completely distorted, as though she were Alice in Wonderland; another who transforms into a ragdoll whenever she even thinks about moving. The brain is the most complex structure in the universe. Neurologists must puzzle out life-changing diagnoses from the tiniest of clues, the ultimate medical detective work.
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Not As Compelling...
- By Douglas on 11-08-18
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Truth Doesn't Have a Side
- My Alarming Discovery About the Danger of Contact Sports
- By: Dr. Bennet Omalu, Mark Tabb, Will Smith - foreword
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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One day in 2002 the 50-year old body of former Pittsburgh Steeler and hall of famer Mike Webster was laid on a cold table in front of pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu. Webster's body looked to Omalu like the body of a much older man, and the circumstances of his behavior prior to his death were clouded in mystery. But when Omalu cut into Webster's brain, it appeared to be normal. Something didn't add up.
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Truly Enlightening
- By Marie on 01-31-20
By: Dr. Bennet Omalu, and others
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Paranormality
- The Science of the Supernatural
- By: Richard Wiseman
- Narrated by: Peter Noble
- Length: 7 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Professor Richard Wiseman is clear about one thing: paranormal phenomena don't exist. But in the same way that the science of space travel transforms our everyday lives, so research into telepathy, fortune-telling and out of body experiences produces remarkable insights into our brains, behaviour and beliefs.
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great insight into what one believes is paranormal
- By Ony on 07-10-16
By: Richard Wiseman
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The Gift of Adversity
- The Unexpected Benefits of Life's Difficulties, Setbacks, and Imperfections
- By: Norman E. Rosenthal M.D.
- Narrated by: Erik Synnestvedt
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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The noted research psychiatrist explores how life's disappointments and difficulties provide us with the lessons we need to become better, bigger, and more resilient human beings. Adversity is an irreducible fact of life. Although we can and should learn from all experiences, both positive and negative best-selling author Dr. Norman E. Rosenthal believes that adversity is by far the best teacher most of us will ever encounter.
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Book ruined by the narrator
- By David C. on 12-07-22
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The Neuroscientist Who Lost Her Mind
- My Tale of Madness and Recovery
- By: Barbara K. Lipska, Elaine McArdle - contributor
- Narrated by: Emma Powell
- Length: 6 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2015, Barbara Lipska - a leading expert on the neuroscience of mental illness - was diagnosed with melanoma that had spread to her brain. Within months, her frontal lobe, the seat of cognition, began shutting down. She descended into madness, exhibiting dementia- and schizophrenia-like symptoms that terrified her family and coworkers. But miraculously, the immunotherapy her doctors had prescribed worked quickly. Just eight weeks after her nightmare began, Lipska returned to normal. With one difference: she remembered her brush with madness with exquisite clarity.
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Be Prepared To Feel Insane--
- By Gillian on 04-11-18
By: Barbara K. Lipska, and others
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Splendid Solution
- Jonas Salk and the Conquest of Polio
- By: Jeffrey Kluger
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 13 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Salk became a cultural hero and icon for a whole generation. Now, at the fiftieth anniversary of the first national vaccination program, and as humanity is tantalizingly close to eradicating polio worldwide, comes this unforgettable chronicle. Salk's work was an unparalleled achievement, and it makes for a magnificent listen.
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Excellent book
- By Tim on 08-10-06
By: Jeffrey Kluger
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An Anthropologist on Mars
- Seven Paradoxical Tales
- By: Oliver Sacks
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis, Oliver Sacks
- Length: 11 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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To these seven narratives of neurological disorder Dr. Sacks brings the same humanity, poetic observation, and infectious sense of wonder that are apparent in his bestsellers Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. These men, women, and one extraordinary child emerge as brilliantly adaptive personalities, whose conditions have not so much debilitated them as ushered them into another reality.
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SACKS IS AN ABSOLUTE JOY !!
- By Jeff on 09-22-13
By: Oliver Sacks
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The Inheritance
- A Family on the Front Lines of the Battle Against Alzheimer's Disease
- By: Niki Kapsambelis
- Narrated by: Callie Beaulieu
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Every 69 seconds, someone is diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Of the top 10 killers, it is the only disease for which there is no cure or treatment. For most people, there is nothing that they can do to fight back. But one family is doing all they can. The DeMoe family has the most devastating form of the disease that there is: early onset Alzheimer's, an inherited genetic mutation that causes the disease in 100 percent of cases, and has a 50 percent chance of being passed onto the next generation.
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A Cover-to-Cover Slug in the Gut, but Inspiring
- By Gillian on 04-16-17
By: Niki Kapsambelis
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Return to Life
- Extraordinary Cases of Children Who Remember Past Lives
- By: Jim B. Tucker
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 7 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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A first-person account of Jim Tucker's experiences with a number of extraordinary children with memories of past lives, Return to Life focuses mostly on American cases, presenting each family's story and describing his investigation. His goal is to determine what happened-what the child has said, how the parents have reacted, whether the child's statements match the life of a particular deceased person, and whether the child could have learned such information through normal means.
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might not be what you're looking for
- By Janet Beyo on 05-02-15
By: Jim B. Tucker
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King of Hearts
- The True Story of the Maverick Who Pioneered Open Heart Surgery
- By: G. Wayne Miller
- Narrated by: Patrick Cullen
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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G. Wayne Miller has dramatically and meticulously reconstructed an amazing true story: how a group of renegade Minnesota surgeons, led by Dr. Walt Lillehei, made medical history by becoming the first doctors to operate deep inside the human heart.
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Loved every minute
- By Brian on 02-05-08
By: G. Wayne Miller
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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 Undead
- Organ Harvesting, The Ice-Water Test, Beating Heart Cadavers - How Medicine Is Blurring the Line Between Life and Death
- By: Dick Teresi
- Narrated by: David Marantz
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Important and provocative, The Undead examines why even with the tools of advanced technology, what we think of as life and death, consciousness and nonconsciousness, is not exactly clear - and how this problem has been further complicated by the business of organ harvesting.
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Eye opening
- By Amy Giglio on 07-01-18
By: Dick Teresi
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Smarter
- The New Science of Building Brain Power
- By: Dan Hurley
- Narrated by: Erik Synnestvedt
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Expanding upon one of the most-read New York Times Magazine features of 2012, Smarter penetrates the hot new field of intelligence research to reveal what researchers call a revolution in human intellectual abilities. Shattering decades of dogma, scientists began publishing studies in 2008 showing that "fluid intelligence" - the ability to learn, solve novel problems, and get to the heart of things - can be increased through training. But is it all just hype?
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People Who Like This Sort of Thing....
- By W Perry Hall on 10-10-15
By: Dan Hurley
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What listeners say about Patient H.M.
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Sarah Rice
- 04-12-22
Of two minds about it
This story is fascinating and thoroughly detailed without being boring. I struggled with the morality of it though; considering how much has evolved in medical ethics, it was at times heartbreaking to hear how things used to be or how some doctors felt about their practice.
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- Lydia
- 10-15-19
Overall enjoyable but a bit long winded
I really enjoyed the story overall, but it seemed to go back and forth a lot and veer off on loosely related side tangents. I think some of the extra stuff could have been cut out but overall very interesting story regarding HM as well as the personal family story. I do think the parts about Suzanne had a very negative tone, and could have benefitted from more unbiased story telling.
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2 people found this helpful
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- JustBill
- 08-27-16
We all have suffered to a degree.
Always question wayward physicians, especially after this sobering read. The soul is within us all.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Ning Mao
- 09-13-20
A complete picture of the history of science
Love this book! It offered such an interesting and dramatic view of the important people and events in the development of neuroscience - never a world of black or white; and it’s a continuous tug-a-war at the balance of scientific advancement and ethics. Even more striking is the data protectionism that’s told at the end of the stories.
I highly recommend it to anyone, and it could be a must-read for those working in science.
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- Douglas
- 11-02-16
Fascinating!
A marvelous neurological biography full of medicine, history and human pathos! Amazingly good! I have read a lot in this field and this is truly a great book.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Corey Hollander
- 08-15-16
Great story
What a great lesson in the history of neuroscience. enjoyed the narration very much. This was a perfect relationship between story, after and narrator.
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- Susan Schulte Hara
- 09-12-16
An Evolutionary Tale into Patient HM and the Predictable HealthCare Professionals
A Neurosurgeon will always cut, it's predictable, he never stands in the back if the room to observe. A psychologist will always asks innumerable questions that hint at many roads of possibilities. A Journalist will always find a new, intriguing angle for a story. All predictable. Dittrich engages the audience in a convoluted, yet related story about famous Patient HM. Surprised that some procedures seem so barbaric, not surprising that all professions predictably acted the way the were trained.
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- Lulu
- 08-29-16
Patient H.M. - A minor character
This book is supposed to primarily be about the most important neuroscience patient in history. And he is certainly discussed, but I never really understood exactly what we learned from studying him for so many years. I assume it must have been valuable, but I am hard pressed to understand what was learned that was worth the dismal quality of life of this poor man. Before I even got to the controversial part of the book, that evidently has the neuroscience community up in arms, I had already decided that the person primarily responsible for him a Dr. Corkin, treated him irresponsibly. It was obvious that those treating him had forgotten he was human.
The studies with H.M. just seemed to be series of interviews asking him the same questions, mostly quite inane, and his response which was always consistent. If I, as a total layman figured out after the 2nd or 3rd interview that the guy had no short term memory, I don't get what they were trying to prove by asking him the same question, several times a year over the course of a decade.
But I did find the story of the author's grandparent's fascinating. Creepy, but fascinating.
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- Ryan Livingston
- 08-19-16
Fantastic
Loved this book. Why do reviews have to have so many words? Balderdash I say.
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- Mark My Words
- 09-28-16
Luke Dittrich sheds light of truth
A difficult topic but this book shares secrets that have been hiiden away for decades. Medical history is fasinating and so is this book. The paralells provided to the Nazi experiments were enlightening and educational. This is definitely worth the time to "read" in its entirity.
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