Henry Marsh

What is it really like to be a brain surgeon, to hold someone's life in your hands, to drill down into the stuff that creates thought, feeling and reason? How do you live with the consequences of performing a potentially life-saving operation when it all goes wrong? In this powerful, gripping and brutally honest account, one of the country's top neurosurgeons reveals what it is to play god in the face of the life-and-death situations he encounters daily. Henry Marsh gives a rare insight into the intense drama of the operating the.

Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery

Do No Harm

The International Bestseller "Consistently entertaining...Honesty is abundantly apparent here--a quality as rare and commendable in elite surgeons as one suspects it is in memoirists." —The Guardian "Disarmingly frank storytelling...his reflections on death and dying equal those in Atul Gawande's excellent Being Mortal." —The Economist Henry Marsh has spent a lifetime operating on the surgical frontline. There have been exhilarating highs and devastating lows, but his love for the practice of neurosurgery has never wavered. Following the publication of his celebrated New York Times bestseller Do No Harm, Marsh retired from his full-time job in England to work pro bono in Ukraine and Nepal. In Admissions he describes the difficulties of working in these troubled, impoverished countries and the further insights it has given him into the practice of medicine. Marsh also faces up to the burden of responsibility that can come with trying to reduce human suffering. Unearthing memories of his early days as a medical student, and the experiences that shaped him as a young surgeon, he explores the difficulties of a profession that deals in probabilities rather than certainties, and where the overwhelming urge to prolong life can come at a tragic cost for patients and those who love them. Reflecting on what forty years of handling the human brain has taught him, Marsh finds a different purpose in life as he approaches the end of his professional career and a fresh understanding of what matters to us all in the end.

Life as a Brain Surgeon

Admissions

A New York Times Bestseller Shortlisted for both the Guardian First Book Prize and the Costa Book Award Longlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction A Finalist for the Pol Roger Duff Cooper Prize A Finalist for the Wellcome Book Prize A Financial Times Best Book of the Year An Economist Best Book of the Year A Washington Post Notable Book of the Year What is it like to be a brain surgeon? How does it feel to hold someone's life in your hands, to cut into the stuff that creates thought, feeling, and reason? How do you live with the consequences of performing a potentially lifesaving operation when it all goes wrong? In neurosurgery, more than in any other branch of medicine, the doctor's oath to "do no harm" holds a bitter irony. Operations on the brain carry grave risks. Every day, leading neurosurgeon Henry Marsh must make agonizing decisions, often in the face of great urgency and uncertainty. If you believe that brain surgery is a precise and exquisite craft, practiced by calm and detached doctors, this gripping, brutally honest account will make you think again. With astonishing compassion and candor, Marsh reveals the fierce joy of operating, the profoundly moving triumphs, the harrowing disasters, the haunting regrets, and the moments of black humor that characterize a brain surgeon's life. Do No Harm provides unforgettable insight into the countless human dramas that take place in a busy modern hospital. Above all, it is a lesson in the need for hope when faced with life's most difficult decisions.

Stories of Life, Death, and Brain Surgery

en neurokirurgs memoarer

Liv, död och hjärnkirurgi

Henry Marsh has spent a lifetime operating on the surgical frontline. There have been exhilarating highs and devastating lows, but his love for the practice of neurosurgery has never wavered. Prompted by his retirement from his full-time job in the NHS, and through his continuing work in Nepal and Ukraine, Henry has been forced to reflect more deeply about what forty years spent handling the human brain has taught him. Moving between encounters with patients in his London hospital, to those he treats in the more extreme circumstances of his work abroad, Henry faces up to the burden of responsibility that can come with trying to reduce human suffering. Unearthing memories of his early days as a medical student, and the experiences that shaped him as a young surgeon, he explores the difficulties of a profession that deals in probabilities rather than certainties, and where the overwhelming urge to prolong life can come at a tragic cost for both patients and for those who love them. In this searing, provocative and deeply personal memoir, the bestselling author of Do No Harm finds new purpose in his own life as he approaches the end of his professional career, and a fresh understanding of what matters to us all in the end.

A Life in Brain Surgery

Sakin Zarar Verme

El eminente neurocirujano británico Henry Marsh expone a ojos del mundo la esencia de una de las especialidades médicas más difíciles, delicadas y fascinantes que existen. El resultado es este volumen que poco tiempo después de su publicación se encaramó a las listas de más vendidos del Sunday Times y el New York Times. Escogido «Mejor Libro del Año» por el Financial Times y The Economist, obtuvo los premios PEN Ackerley y South Bank Sky Arts y fue finalista del Costa Book Award, el Guardian First Book Award y el Samuel Johnson de no ficción. A los mandos de un microscopio ultrapotente y un catéter de alta precisión, el doctor Marsh se abre camino por los intersticios del cerebro. Con frecuencia, de su pericia y de su pulso dependen que un paciente recupere la visión o acabe en una silla de ruedas. Hay días en los que salva vidas, pero también hay jornadas nefastas en las que un pequeño error o una cadena de infortunios lo hacen sentirse el ser más desdichado sobre la faz de la Tierra. Mucho más cercano a una confesión personal que a una autobiografía complaciente con el autor, este libro -cuyo título se inspira en el juramento hipocrático- supone un auténtico alarde de valentía y de honestidad intelectual, un relato vibrante y luminoso que logra remover nuestros sentimientos más profundos y ensanchar nuestro umbral de sabiduría y compasión. Reseñas: «La neurociencia ha encontrado a su Boswell en Henry Marsh. Dolorosamente honesto sobre los errores que pueden "destrozar" un cerebro, exquisitamente sintonizado con el vínculo tenso y efímero entre médico y paciente, hilarantemente irritable ante la gestión hospitalaria, Marsh nos sumerge en el arte más difícil de la medicina y nos levanta el ánimo. Un logro soberbio.» Ian McEwan «Increíblemente absorbente [...]. Una visión tan sincera que sorprende y asombra.» Bill Bryson «El doctor Marsh revisa su vocación de una forma íntima, compasiva y, a ratos, aterradora.» Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times «Ante todo, no hagas daño es un conjunto de elegantes reflexiones al final de una larga carrera. Algunas de las historias son lo bastante emotivas como para llevarnos hasta las lágrimas [...]. En el fondo, éste es un libro acerca de la sabiduría y la experiencia.» The Telegraph

Ante todo, no hagas daño

Ao ver uma ordem desrespeitada por razões burocráticas, e num ataque de fúria, o neurocirurgião Henry Marsh agarra o nariz a um pobre enfermeiro e torce-o com violência. No dia seguinte, o médico pede desculpas e entrega a carta de demissão. Já não suporta a degradação crescente do Serviço Nacional de Saúde Britânico. Não tolera a erosão da sua autoridade, num sistema cada vez mais frio e mecanizado. Reformado, procura definir o passo seguinte. Ainda se sente útil e capaz, mas não ali. Oferece-se para operar pro bono, começa a passar temporadas na Ucrânia, no Nepal, a trabalhar em situações extremas, a testemunhar uma miséria sem fim. De regresso a Inglaterra descobre um casebre abandonado, em Oxford, junto ao rio Tamisa. E é para lá que volta, nos intervalos das viagens. Amante de ferramentas e do trabalho manual, começa a reconstruir a casa.A reconstrução, tábua a tábua, é a metáfora perfeita em redor da qual se tecem estas memórias. Recorda a sua turbulenta juventude, o seu nascimento enquanto cirurgião. Mas foca-se sobretudo no fim que se aproxima, o medo que o corpo falhe, ou, pior ainda, a mente. Com a mesma desassombrada lucidez de Não Faças Mal, Henry Marsh retoma aqui as questões que o atormentaram durante 40 anos, o que fez de bom e de mau, o que poderia ter feito melhor.

Hoje Deu Entrada no Hospital

Po pierwsze nie szkodzic

Sem causar mal

Не навреди. Истории о жизни, смерти и нейрохирургии

O que sentira um neurocirurgi?o ao tomar a consciencia de que esta a manipular, a cortar a propria materia de que s?o feitas as emoc?es, memorias e pensamentos? N?o lhe tremera a m?o, sabendo que um erro pode ser fatal? Se imagina a neurocirurgia como uma pratica precisa, sofisticada, levada a cabo por medicos inacessiveis, este livro vai faze-lo mudar de ideias. Henry Marsh, um dos mais conceituados neurocirurgi?es britanicos, exp?e-se aqui com uma honestidade rara na literatura medica. Pagina a pagina, descobrimos-lhe as diferentes facetas. Conhecemos o profissional obsessivo, movido pela "adrenalina da caca", pelo gozo feroz de operar; sentimos-lhe a mal disfarcada vaidade na hora do triunfo; tememos por ele no bloco operatorio quando tudo se desfaz e o vemos, "como um deus irado", a praguejar em ataques de furia. Quando porem termina a cirurgia e se deixa cair exausto na cadeira, sentimo-lo subitamente proximo, falivel, quebrado. Ouvimo-lo confessar a ansiedade eternamente renovada antes de entrar no bloco operatorio. Compreendemos o seu medo de dar esperanca aos pacientes (ou o medo, ainda maior, de n?o dar). Perdoamos-lhe a tentac?o de fugir dos familiares quando tem de se apresentar diante deles, de ombros curvados, a carregar a noticia, o erro, a culpa. E e essa a imagem que fica de N?o Facas Mal, o rosto humano de um medico que, no fim de carreira, procura a expiac?o.

Não Faças Mal

Combines biographies of the Roman emperors from Julius Caesar to the sack of Rome, 410 A. D. with a study of how the office of emperor changed during the era.

The Roman Empire and Its Rulers

The Caesars

The Story of Christ as Seen Against the Historical Conflict Between the Roman Empire and Judaism

The Rebel King

Helps readers evaluate what principles drive them and how they can change their lives by rooting out negative principles

Creating a Life of Value for Success and Happiness

The Breakthrough Factor

**AS HEARD ON BBC RADIO 4** **A BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE TIMES, DAILY TELEGRAPH AND FINANCIAL TIMES** As a neurosurgeon, I lived in a world filled with fear and suffering, death and cancer. But rarely, if ever, did I think about what it would be like if what I witnessed at work every day happened to me. This book is the story of how I became a patient myself. Retired brain surgeon Henry Marsh thought he understood illness, but he was unprepared for the impact of his diagnosis of advanced cancer. And Finally explores what happens when someone who has spent a lifetime on the frontline of life and death finds himself contemplating what might be his own death sentence. As Henry navigates the bewildering transition from doctor to patient, he is haunted by past failures and projects yet to be completed, and frustrated by the inconveniences of illness and old age. But he is also more entranced than ever by the mysteries of science and the brain, the beauty of the natural world and his love for his family. Elegiac, candid, luminous and poignant, And Finally is ultimately not so much a book about death, but a book about life and what matters in the end. 'Magnificent' Rachel Clarke, author of Breath-taking 'Given its subject - broadly, death and disease - the book is unexpectedly fun, and the author pretty much irresistibly likable' Guardian 'Facing his own mortality, Marsh has written a vividly wry and honest book' The Times 'Marsh shares his journey with a dark yet whimsical humour, and ponders too the eternal mysteries of time' Daily Telegraph, Books of the Year 2022

Matters of Life and Death, the Sunday Times bestseller from the author of DO NO HARM

And Finally

Henry Marsh has spent four decades operating on the human brain. In this searing and provocative memoir, following his retirement from the NHS, he reflects on the experiences that have shaped his career and life, gaining a deeper understanding of what matters to us all in the end.

Y Al Final, Asuntos de Vida O Muerte / And Finally

In this fascinating and moving collection, Henry Marsh once again uses his exceptional poetic gifts to take us to the heart of one of the most difficult periods of Scottish history. His feeling for place and for the personalities involved is such that we feel we are there - living through the religious wars and tribal wars of seventeenth century Scotland, at the side of the Marquis of Montrose, one of the towering figures of the time. Henry Marsh's poetry brings those times to life in a way in which prose simply cannot: here is the feeling, the passion, the sheer colour of events in which, as the poet reminds us in his introduction, we can find features sometimes evident in our own troubled times. This is a book for those who wish to know what it was like to be of that time, and that place. It is a great and echoing poetic achievement.

The Last Journey of the Great Marquis

Under Winter Skies

The 2017 National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) Finalist, International Bestseller, and a Kirkus Best Nonfiction Book of 2017! “Marsh has retired, which means he’s taking a thorough inventory of his life. His reflections and recollections make Admissions an even more introspective memoir than his first, if such a thing is possible.” —The New York Times "Consistently entertaining...Honesty is abundantly apparent here--a quality as rare and commendable in elite surgeons as one suspects it is in memoirists." —The Guardian "Disarmingly frank storytelling...his reflections on death and dying equal those in Atul Gawande's excellent Being Mortal." —The Economist Henry Marsh has spent a lifetime operating on the surgical frontline. There have been exhilarating highs and devastating lows, but his love for the practice of neurosurgery has never wavered. Following the publication of his celebrated New York Times bestseller Do No Harm, Marsh retired from his full-time job in England to work pro bono in Ukraine and Nepal. In Admissions he describes the difficulties of working in these troubled, impoverished countries and the further insights it has given him into the practice of medicine. Marsh also faces up to the burden of responsibility that can come with trying to reduce human suffering. Unearthing memories of his early days as a medical student, and the experiences that shaped him as a young surgeon, he explores the difficulties of a profession that deals in probabilities rather than certainties, and where the overwhelming urge to prolong life can come at a tragic cost for patients and those who love them. Reflecting on what forty years of handling the human brain has taught him, Marsh finds a different purpose in life as he approaches the end of his professional career and a fresh understanding of what matters to us all in the end.

Henry Marsh

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