Reviews tagging 'Grief'

Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital by Sheri Fink

10 reviews

emiliamaria76's review

challenging dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Mental illness, Murder, Grief, Abandonment, Emotional abuse, Excrement, Dementia, Death, Medical trauma, Animal death, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Blood, Child death, Animal cruelty, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Chronic illness

mischiefmimi's review against another edition

challenging dark hopeful informative sad tense slow-paced

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Medical trauma, Racism, Police brutality, Medical content, Death of parent, Grief, Chronic illness, Dementia, Terminal illness, Animal death, Addiction, Cancer, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Injury/Injury detail

effortlesslybookishbre_'s review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? N/A
• Strong character development? N/A

Five Days at Memorial attempts to tell the story of doctors and nurses who had to survive in a storm ailed hospital after Hurricane Katrina, and the levees breaking soon after. 

While this books premise is intriging and at times was captivating due to the nature of the story, this book unfortunately fails to deliver on the captivating nature of its subnopsis, Sheri Fink tells the stories of doctors and nurses who made life and death decisions for their patients while also baddling the elements of one of the worst natural disaster in U.S. history. Trying to follow the events of this book was difficult due to the author quickly flipping points of views to past, present, and between quotes or alleged quotes from individuals who were there as events unfolded. While usually this would be an interesting literary choice especially when you are trying to give an oral history about events, but in this context it made this book feel very jumbled and not concise once one topic is discussed it quickly shifted to a different piece of the story, or to a doctor or nurse who gives alleged facts about the event. 

This books focus is said to be on the events that had taken place before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina and how euthanasia was allegedly unethically used, but this book majorly focuses on the outside events and how the public reacted to doctors and nurses who participated in euthanasia it especially tries to in some ways rehabilitate the images of the accused doctors and nurses by quoting the public, their colleagues, and family members. Yet that same effort was not given to the deceased families, another major downfall of this book was the inability to staunchly say the failings of the response to the disaster around New Orleans but especially at Charity Hospital was due to Classism, Racism, and Ableist practices. 

While mentioned briefly it was not covered nearly enough how the failings of government agencies failed the people of New Orleans due to faulty infrastructure and Systematic Racism, politicians labeled its own citizens as looters and rioters when they were simply just trying to survive, especially in a situation where they were seemingly given up on. The book spends more time trying to paint lawyers as just money hungry vultures, who just saw an opportunity for a pay day by defending those who were seeking answers to their loved one’s death. 

The authors focus seemed to be more on the euthanizing of doctors and nurses animals versus the families emotions of learning their loved ones had died, there was also little mention and historical context behind the ableist history of and behind merciful death. The families were not nearly as much of a focus as they should have been their stories felt as if they were an afterthought. I would also have liked for the author to go into detail about how in times of crisis the most venerable are not considered and how even in times were there is a dire situation disabled/ and or individuals who need more care are not considered and their lives are seen as disposable. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Chronic illness, Death, Grief, Ableism, Classism, Medical content, and Medical trauma

quiet_reader's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad tense slow-paced

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Death of parent, Blood, Violence, Body shaming, Death, Drug abuse, Animal cruelty, Terminal illness, Medical content, Vomit, Fatphobia, Grief, Abandonment, Animal death, Excrement, Gaslighting, Medical trauma, and Murder

Moderate: Classism

Minor: Addiction, Cancer, Chronic illness, and Police brutality

heatherilene's review

challenging dark emotional informative slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Animal death, Cancer, Ableism, Death, Death of parent, Grief, Medical trauma, Chronic illness, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Racism, and Terminal illness

streberkatze's review against another edition

The first part of the book was incredibly gripping. Fink did an incredible job showing the reader the complexity of the situation and the sheer desperation and exhaustion that underlay everything that happened at Memorial Hospital during those five days. And she does so without ever being sensationalist. But while I appreciated this level of detail in the first part, it was too much for me in the second part. I gave it another try by listening to the audiobook version, but it was just too slow for me (especially so much has been written about the legal battle that ensued in shorter form). I'd still recommend this book. The second part just wasn't for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Death, Grief, and Medical content

Moderate: Terminal illness, Cancer, Excrement, and Murder

ktdakotareads's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Medical content, Death, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, and Grief

tomato_bisque's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative medium-paced

4.0

The first third is a fast paced account of what occured over the day of the hurricane and the tragedies that followed in the days after. The later part of the book slows down and discusses the aftermath (investigations, rebuilding, political ramifications.) This might have been more compelling pre-covid but the fact that the US medical system and government cannot handle any sort of large scale disaster should not be surprising anymore. 

The book brings up ethical conundrums about how we should ration care in times of crisis. There are not easy answers.

Being unfamilar with the case, I was honestly kinda surprised how general public and the medical field rallied around Pou. Thank god the book expressed the dissenting points of views from other doctors because I thought I was going insane.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Chronic illness, Abandonment, Animal death, Death, Medical content, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Police brutality, Chronic illness, and Grief

mscalls's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative reflective tense fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Animal death, Cancer, Chronic illness, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Murder, Terminal illness, Torture, and War

sara_lena's review against another edition

dark informative sad tense slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Blood, Cancer, Chronic illness, Death, Death of parent, Excrement, Grief, Medical content, Medical trauma, and Terminal illness