House of God
House of God is a book by Samuel Shem (a pseudonym of Professor of Psychiatry Stephen Bergman), which was originally published in 1978. With its very cynical portrayal of the training of young doctors in hospitals, the book caused a considerable change in public opinion and was thus one of the reasons for the reform of medical education in the USA in the 1980s.
content
Dr. Roy Basch is a new intern (for example: assistant doctor) in a hospital called House of God , after he finished his medical studies at the BMS ( Best Medical School ). He is poorly prepared for the grueling services and the sudden responsibility, and even the more experienced doctors hardly help him. He survived the year (in contrast to one of his fellow students who committed suicide) thanks to various factors: his girlfriend Berry, various affairs with nurses (which are described in great detail) and an enigmatic assistant doctor who is only called The Fat . He supports his protégés with knowledge such as the "Rules of the House of God", which are of central importance in the book. The book ends with the resident psychiatrist, Dr. Cohen, tempted almost the entire internship class to pursue a career in psychiatry. The sequel Mount Misery tells about this .
Context and impact
The book is very autobiographical. The BMS stands for the Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the House of God stands for the Beth Israel Hospital , a hospital affiliated to the HMS in Boston . The often mentioned "MBH" (Mans best hospital) is actually the Massachusetts General Hospital . Of course, the story is exaggerated in some places, but a large number of doctors can recognize their own experiences in it.
Many of the terms developed in the book have found their way into the language of hospitals:
- Gomer: Get Out of My Emergency Room - "A human being who, often through age, has lost what defines a person" (The Fat One)
- LAD in GAZ: Dear old lady in good general condition, no omer
- Zebra: A very unlikely diagnosis that would have another diagnosis that would explain the symptoms better ("If you hear hoofs stamped, it's probably horses, not zebras").
Rules of the House of God
- Gomers don't die.
- Gomer go to the ground.
- If you have a cardiac arrest, feel your own pulse first.
- The patient is the one who is sick.
- Think about relocation first.
- There is no body cavity that cannot be reached with a size 14 cannula and a safe, strong arm.
- Age + serum urea = Lasix dose .
- They can still torment you more.
- The only good pick is a dead pick.
- If you don't take a temperature, you won't have a fever.
- Show me a PJler (in the German edition it actually says: Student of the BMS) who only triples my work, and I'll kiss his feet.
- If a radiologist who is still in specialist training (in the German book edition it actually says: "Radiology resident") and a doctoral student see something abnormal on a chest image , nothing abnormal can be there.
- The best medical care is to do as little as possible and do a lot of it.
reception
In 1984 there was a film adaptation of the book.
The series Scrubs - The Beginners also has clear parallels to the book. For one, the plot is very similar in that scrubs are also about doctors in their early years in a hospital. On the other hand, many terms and ideas are taken up (e.g. the cynical mentor or the description of patients as omer ). Likewise, the Grey's Anatomy series . For example, in both series the quote "If you hear hoofbeats, it doesn't have to be zebras". This quote is also used in the series Dr. House used. This is the principle of Occam's razor , also known as Occam's scalpel, which is often used in medicine .
bibliography
- Samuel Shem: The House of God. Droemer Knaur, 1998, ISBN 3-426-60906-1 .
- Samuel Shem: Mount Misery Droemer Knaur, 2000, ISBN 3-426-61460-X (continued from House of God)
- Samuel Shem: Man's 4th Best Hospital, 2019, ISBN 978-1-984805-36-2