Death Education for the Health Professional

Irving Cooper describes his life as a neurosurgeon in a way that is interesting and often so inspiring to patients that Dr. MacDonald Critchley compares Cooper's message to the inscription over the gateway to the medical facility at the University of Wales: "Without inspiration, technical skill is not enough." Not Quite a Miracle is not quite an inspiration. The idea of having a subject index seems inappropriate. An example of one of the entries is "micro-scalpels, use of, 115." When you do look at page 115, what you find is, "In a few minutes, without looking up from the microscope, Dr. M. called for a micro-scalpel." In a counterproductive statement for the patient-reader of this book, the authors write, "More people died in neurosurgical operating rooms than in bull rings, by far." It may have been true that Hemingway wrote brilliant accounts of bull-fighting, never having been a matador himself; however, bull-fighting is a spectator sport and surgery is not. In general, what the authors present is well-written, accessible to laymen, and at times provocative. Yet while a main intent of the authors is to present an account of neurosurgery that will be both useful and even inspirational to those undergoing surgery, what they achieve seems unsatisfactory and does not fulfill their goal.