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A review by savaging
Gesundheit!: Bringing Good Health to You, the Medical System, and Society through Physician Service, Complementary Therapies, Humor, and Joy by Patch Adams, Maureen Mylander
2.0
Is there something wrong with me if I can't bring myself to trust Patch Adams? All those beautiful ideas, and here I am with my arms folded and looking half away.
This book is a useful reminder to live with humor; a useful reminder that every dying person is actually a living person. But beyond this utility, Patch feels a little too bright for me. No shadows, no worries, no existential despair in the face of death. Humility, yes, but no self-doubt.
The book is a critique of not only modern medicine but also leftist attempts to improve it, along the track of Ivan Illich. And yet, Patch's non-dehumanizing solution is so fragile, tentative -- and as far as I can tell, still unbuilt. (In the meantime, what I wouldn't give for a little single-payer universal coverage . . .)
If eternal hope and a life without existential despair in the face of death sounds like just your thing: this is the book for you.
This book is a useful reminder to live with humor; a useful reminder that every dying person is actually a living person. But beyond this utility, Patch feels a little too bright for me. No shadows, no worries, no existential despair in the face of death. Humility, yes, but no self-doubt.
The book is a critique of not only modern medicine but also leftist attempts to improve it, along the track of Ivan Illich. And yet, Patch's non-dehumanizing solution is so fragile, tentative -- and as far as I can tell, still unbuilt. (In the meantime, what I wouldn't give for a little single-payer universal coverage . . .)
If eternal hope and a life without existential despair in the face of death sounds like just your thing: this is the book for you.