| Life Support: Three Nurses on the Front Lines Contributor(s): Gordon, Suzanne (Author), Fagin, Claire M. (Foreword by) |
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ISBN: 0801474280 ISBN-13: 9780801474286 Publisher: ILR Press OUR PRICE: $17.05 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: November 2007 Annotation: Life Support offers an intimate and important look at what nurses do for patients and their families. It takes us right to the bedside on hospital wards and home visits, in clinics and emergency rooms, capturing the drama of nurses' work in the story of three RNs at Boston's Beth Israel Hospital. Gordon's heroines are nurse practitioner Ellen Kitchen, who bicycles through poor neighborhoods in Boston to visit elderly patients at home; oncology nurse Nancy Rumplik, whose technical skill and emotional support enable cancer patients to endure some of the most arduous high-tech medical treatments; and clinical nurse specialist Jeannie Chaisson, who helps new RNs and physicians begin their careers on a general medical floor. Life Support draws on the experience of these and other nurses to examine the history of their profession, the complex relationship between doctors and nurses, and the central role that nurses play in the final days of life, when care, not cure, is a patient's main concern. In addition, the book makes a powerful critique of hospital restructuring and managed care. Gordon shows how understaffing, shorter hospital stays, layoffs, and replacement of nurses by unlicensed personnel are threatening the quality of care and shifting more of its burden onto patients' families. She describes what consumers can do to resist these trends - through alliances with concerned providers. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Medical | Nursing - Nurse & Patient - Medical | Nursing - Social, Ethical & Legal Issues - Medical | Allied Health Services - Emergency Medical Services |
| Dewey: 610.73 |
| LCCN: 2007033208 |
| Series: Culture and Politics of Health Care Work |
| Physical Information: 0.86" H x 5.58" W x 8.3" (0.90 lbs) 368 pages |
| Themes: - Sex & Gender - Feminine |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: In this book, Suzanne Gordon describes the everyday work of three RNs in Boston--a nurse practitioner, an oncology nurse, and a clinical nurse specialist on a medical unit. At a time when nursing is often undervalued and nurses themselves in short supply, Life Support provides a vivid, engaging, and intimate portrait of health care's largest profession and the important role it plays in patients' lives. Life Support is essential reading for working nurses, nursing students, and anyone considering a career in nursing as well as for physicians and health policy makers seeking a better understanding of what nurses do and why we need them. For the Cornell edition of this landmark work, Gordon has written a new introduction that describes the current nursing crisis and its impact on bedside nurses like those she profiled in the book. |
Contributor Bio(s): Gordon, Suzanne: - Suzanne Gordon is an award-winning journalist. She has written, edited, or co-authored twenty books, including First Do No Harm, Beyond the Checklist, Life Support: Three Nurses on the Front Lines, and Caregiving: Readings in Knowledge, Practice, Ethics, and Politics. She is an adjunct professor in the school of nursing at McGill University. Gordon is a health-care commentator on Public Radio International's Marketplace and a popular lecturer on nursing and health care. Gordon has been published in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, American Prospect, Atlantic Monthly, Harpers Magazine. She has been a radio and TV commentator for CBS Radio and NPR's Marketplace. She lives in Arlington, Massachusetts.Fagin, Claire M.: - Suzanne Gordon is an award-winning journalist. She is Visiting Professor at the University of Maryland School of Nursing and Assistant Adjunct Professor at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Nursing. She is the author of Nursing against the Odds, the coauthor of From Silence to Voice, and the coeditor of The Complexities of Care, all from Cornell. Claire Fagin is Leadership Professor Emerita, Dean Emerita and Interim President Emerita at the University of Pennsylvania. |