Accidental Kindness: A Doctor's Notes on Empathy

by Michael Stein

Overview

We will all be patients sooner or later. And when we go to the doctor, when we're hurting, we tend to think in terms of cause and condemnation. We often look for relief not only from physical symptoms but also from our self-blame. We want from our doctors kindness under any of its many names: empathy, caring, compassion, humanity. We look for safety and forgiveness. But we forget that doctors, too, are often in need of forgiveness—from their patients and from themselves. No doctor enters the medical profession expecting to be unkind or to make mistakes, but because of the complexity of our current medical system and because doctors are human, they often find themselves acting much less kindly than they would like to. Drawing on his work as a primary care physician and a behavioral scientist, Michael Stein artfully examines the often conflicting goals of patients and their doctors. In those differences, Stein recognizes that kindness should not be a patient's forbidden or unrealistic expectation. This book leaves us with new knowledge of and insights into what we might hope for, and what might go wrong, or right, in the most intimate clinical moments.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469671819
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	10/18/2022
Pages:	218
Sales rank:	704,125
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Michael Stein, M.D., is award-winning author of six novels and four books of nonfiction, most recently Broke: Patients Talk About Money with Their Doctor. He is professor of health policy at the Boston University School of Public Health and executive editor of PublicHealthPost.org.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

With refreshing candor and page-turning prose, Stein dives deep into his own experience as a medical student, internist, son, and patient to look at the ways that doctor-patient interactions can influence care and patient outcomes, and what happens when doctors make mistakes. One of the most powerful, honest, and insightful books I've read by a doctor."—Belle Boggs, author of The Art of Waiting: On Fertility, Medicine, and Motherhood



Michael Stein is a thoughtful, compassionate, exceptional physician, and the same qualities are evident on every page of Accidental Kindness. These intimate and breathtaking patient stories remind me that the essence of medicine is to ease suffering, however and wherever and in whomever it occurs."—Dr. Gavin Francis, author of Adventures in Being Human



In this beautifully written meditation, Stein talks about trying to be the doctor his patients needed, what he did when he fell short, and how working through the challenges of his impossible profession made him a different physician and a different man. This is so much more than a book about medicine. It's about self-acceptance, being an adult, and facing up to what our jobs really require. We all need to discover our capacity for kindness, empathy, and self-compassion. Riveting."—Sherry Turkle, author of Reclaiming Conversation and The Empathy Diaries



Anyone practicing to be more human—that is, practicing to be more kind in this troubling world—will be inspired by Michael Stein's lucid and penetrating meditation on empathy. This book has deep wisdom and hope. I read it in one sitting, and felt that I was drinking powerful medicine in the form of prose."—Sarah Ruhl, Pulitzer Prize finalist, playwright, and author of Smile: The Story of a Face, a memoir

Editorial Reviews

★ 08/08/2022

Internist Stein (Broke: Patients Talk About Money with Their Doctor) reflects on why empathy and kindness matter in these frank and probing essays. In “Remains,” he recalls his early days in medical school, when his “first patient” was a cadaver: “I expected there to be something, anything, in the room besides the gleaming silver and the gray light and the silence.” “Losing Control” is a powerful account of how, frustrated with an HIV patient who kept forgetting to take her medicine, Stein broke a promise with the woman to never mention the diagnosis in front of her daughter, and “Making Impressions” sees Stein become the patient when he seeks a surgeon to address a tumor in his skull. “Full Hearted and Half Empty” is a moving investigation of what’s required for doctors to maintain empathy and composure while communicating bad news or executing painful procedures. “Is there a point where we can no longer differentiate ourselves from others, and all our patients’ pain is ours?” Stein asks. His incisive articulation of the emotional challenges faced by doctors is rendered in prose that’s vivid, candid, and shot through with compassion—it makes for an investigation that’s tough to forget. This is a standout. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

[Stein's] incisive articulation of the emotional challenges faced by doctors is rendered in prose that's vivid, candid, and shot through with compassion—it makes for an investigation that's tough to forget. This is a standout."—STARRED review, Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher