Hurt
ISBN: 9781611689921
Platform/Publisher: Project MUSE / University Press of New England
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Chapters; Download: Chapters
Subjects: Emergency Medical Services; Wounds and Injuries; Emergency Medicine;

Pediatric surgeon Musemeche (Small: Life and Death on the Front Lines of Pediatric Surgery) vividly brings to life the evolution of trauma care: "a world of its own" focused on the 2.8 million people hospitalized annually with severe injuries. The fast-paced development of this field of medicine, fueled by a startling 1966 report on accidental death and disabilities, has been driven by such little-known but groundbreaking pioneers as epidemiologist Sue Baker, whose 1984 publication of the Injury Fact Book documented the "magnitude of the injury threat to public safety"; Phil Hallen, who created the blueprint for a trained ambulance service; R. Adams Cowley, whose understanding of the life-or-death first "golden hour" after injury led to the creation of specialized trauma-care units; Charles Drew, whose blood-banking system helped "change the course of history"; and the military surgeons in Iraq who both advanced the treatment of gunshot victims and scientific understanding of the brain's ability to heal. Musemeche's fast-paced medical history mixes the gritty reality of treating life-threatening injuries-including her own heart-pounding experiences as surgeon-with an unfettered optimism about what trauma care can now promise: an assurance that most people will survive even a devastating injury. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

CATHERINE MUSEMECHE, MD, is a pediatric surgeon and former professor of surgery at the University of Texas Medical School. She is the author of Small: Life and Death on the Front Lines of Pediatric Surgery.

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