Preserving Patients

Author – Dr Tom Parsons

Publisher – Kindle

Date – 2017

Stars – 3.5/5

Review

Being a physician myself, it is not surprising that I liked this book.  With the recent flurry in anecdotal books and memoirs, this is a welcome addition from a novice writer.  Dr Tom Parsons is a pseudonym and care is taken throughout the book to ensure anonymity and patient confidentiality.  As other reviewers have commented this book has a similar aim as Adam Kay and that would always be a hard act to follow.  I don’t think he has done a bad job though.

The book begins with the writers first day as a doctor and progresses through his two year foundation programme.  Most of the stories are funny (but maybe their funnier for those in the clinical setting) and there are a few snippets of the quirks and downsides to the NHS.  I would agree that some of these stories have been heard before but I wouldn’t say that was due to copying, these things tend to happen to lots of doctors independently.  We all have a story about a patient with an item in their back passage for which they have little explanation but there is something about the way Parsons tells his story that makes it so hilarious.

For those non-medical readers, there is a useful glossary and references littered throughout the manuscript which gives explanations for some medical jargon used at times.  I think this is a nice touch.  My only reservations are with proofreading and an extremely impromptu ending.  This is a real shame as the book was well-conceived and full of great stories.  I’m not sure whether the ending was so abrupt as the author plans a sequel or whether he just gave up but I think all readers would want to know the outcome of that situation.  There may be a case for Dr Parsons to release a second edition which has been properly proof-read and rounded up with a nicer, more fulfilling, ending (although maybe no such fulfilling ending ever actually happened and we wouldn’t want fiction).  Maybe a little more professional cover art too but this is of little importance to me. 

Anyway, I’m sure the author is busy getting on with his specialty training but if he was serious about this book then I think he has the skills to be a good writer.  Thanks, Dr Parsons, for sharing your anecdotes and pouring a little humour into what can often be a depressing and sometimes sole-destroying profession.