Table of Contents

1: Ideas in Conflict: The Rise and Fall of New Views of Disease
2: The Changing Concept of the Ideal Physician
3: The Nature of Suffering
4: Suffering in Chronic Illness
5: The Mysterious Relationship Between Doctor and Patient
6: How to Understand Diseases
7: The Pursuit of Disease or the Care of the Sick?
8: Treating the Disease, the Body, or the Patient
9: The Doctor and the Patient
10: Who is This Person?
11: The Measure of the Person
12: The Clinician's Experience: Power Versus Magic in Medicine
13: Mind and Body
14: The Illness Called Dying
15: Pain and Suffering
Epilogue: The Care of the Suffering Patient

About the Author

Eric J Cassell is Clinical Professor of Public Health at Weill Medical College of Cornell University and an attending physician at The New York-Presbyterian Hospital. He is a Fellow and a member of the Board of Directors of the Hastings Center, as well as a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and a Master of the American College of Physicians. His recent books include Changing Values in Medicine, Talking with
Patients, and Doctoring.

Reviews

[The author's] position is humane and compassionate and willing to address that which scares many clinicians - uncertainty and imperfection. I highly recommend this thorough and thoughtful book to anyone who grapples with the problem of human suffering in the midst of illness. Palliative Medicine, 18 Cassell's arguments and discussions are clear and logical and his style makes it a pleasure to read. It is also clinically practical, with many case histories used to introduce and illustrate the discussion. Highly recommended. IAHPC Website