1 comments about Doctor Mary in Arabia: Memoirs.

1. This book tells the story of Dr. Mary Allison, medical missionary in the Arabian Gulf from 1935-1975. Dr. Allison, or Dr. Mary, as she was known in the Gulf, was the daughter of a minister and decided at an early age that she wanted to be a missionary. Since women at that time were not commonly called to the pulpit, she trained as an M.D., a general practitioner, and applied to work for a missionary society as soon as she completed her training. She was sent to Kuwait in 1934, where she served in a mission hospital until 1964, with brief sojourns away during World War when she worked in the US and India. Following her time in Kuwait, she also served in Bahrain and Oman until her retirement in 1975. This book represents her personal memoirs of her years of training and service, stretching from her early childhood through retirement. The book includes a small collection of black and white photographs documenting scenes of daily life in Kuwait and Oman, as well as the clinics where Dr. Allison worked and her patients and helpers.
   
   Dr. Allison comes across as being very modest about her training and skills. She claimed she was of average ability, and many of the anecdotes described in the book tell of her medical failures, although some highlight her successes as well. She possessed an unwavering faith in her particular version of Christianity, heavily influenced by her Dutch heritage. She felt that even if she wasn?t the best doctor in the world, her very presence and willingness to serve gave life and hope to her patients. Given the low level of development in the Gulf at the time and the lack of access to quality medical care, she was able to save hundreds, if not thousands of lives, through her work. As for saving souls, she describes how she only knew of one or two Muslims during her entire 40 years in the Gulf who had converted to Christianity, and seemed to have trouble understanding why more were not attracted to her faith by the kinds of work the mission hospital was offering.
   
   The documentation that Allison provides of mission life in the Gulf during the first part of the Twentieth Century is invaluable. Allison was in the middle of all the changes that came to pass as the oil money began to flow. When she first arrived, she learned to survive and work through the desert summer heat without AC. Her patients came to her with trachoma, tuberculosis, and infected feet from stepping on needles. Then oil company men came from the West, and she even ended up marrying one herself. She describes how the oil money brought AC, electric lights, cars, and schools. If she could re-visit Kuwait today, she would find very little trachoma or infected feet. Instead, there is diabetes, heart disease, and car accidents, the scourge of the Gulf which ensures that polygamy will be a common practice for all of the foreseeable future. Although she left the region before all of these changes came to pass, she could already see them coming.
   
   Anyone who has spent time living in the Gulf will recognize that many traditions have changed very little since the time when Allison first arrived. The Arabs still drink their coffee with cardamom, and a visitor must take 3 cups, swirling the last to signal satiation. Many women are still not free to pursue health care on their own, and medical personnel will not touch a woman, even in an emergency, without a husband?s permission. Blood for transfusions is ever in great need, especially because of the innumerable car accidents, but people don?t die anymore for lack of blood donations because enough ex-pats are around to keep a steady blood supply, and even some Arabs are now willing to donate blood. There is still a dearth of nurses from the Gulf, but the shortage is no longer due to lack of proper education for girls. It turns out that Gulf Arabs just don?t like nursing as a career, so they still import the vast majority of their nurses from India and the Philippines.
   
   Although the information in the book is fascinating in itself, the book could really have used quite a bit more editing. There are a number of places where Dr. Allison repeats the same anecdotes, and she occasionally even confuses the location where she met a particular patient, sometimes saying it was in Kuwait and later in Bahrain, for instance. All in all, though, the book is well worth reading for anyone with an interest in the Gulf, especially those considering taking a medical posting in a Gulf country.

1 comments about The Remarkable Lives of 100 Women Healers and Scientists (20th Century Women).

1. Although an O.K. book to give to young girls about some successful women, the title leads the buyer to believe it is a worldwide overview. The women mentioned are from the U.S., thus Marie Curie, winner of 2 Nobel Prizes (one in Chemistry, one in Physics), is not mentioned. Mary Leakey is not mentioned as a leading anthropologist. No American meteorologist is mentioned, although several are quite famous, including Joanne Simpson.

No comments about Native American Doctor: The Story of Susan Laflesche Picotte (Trailblazer Biographies).

No comments about gimp, surviving your survival: a memoir.

1 comments about Searching for a Clean Bill of Health: One Mother's Story.

1. I think many people have asked members of the Jehovah's Witness faith, "Would they stand by and allow their child to die in a medical situation." Susan Jamieson draws on the experience of Pat Tillman, of the Arizona Cardinals, who chose to put his life on the line for his country and is recognized as a hero. So I think the real question being asked here is "what do we believe in" and do we stick by "our beliefs" when called on to defand them!

2 comments about Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep.

1. Al Oickle has written a tremendously moving account of a family's courage, hope, love and faith as it faces together the death of the wife and mother. Covering only the last few months of the battle with cancer, the journal-style of the work brings the reader not only into the hospital room and the home but also into the minds and hearts of each of the members of this large family. Each one's response is different and changes over time. Reading it, one realizes how much we have learned about death and the dying from researchers like Kubler-Ross, for each stage of reaction to dying is seen in the husband's and children's journal entries. There are times of hope and times of despair, of anger and of resentment. Sometimes the account is minute-by-minute; sometimes there are summaries of days of sameness. The reader comes to know each member of the family and care about Irene, whose life is coming to an end. The author notes in his introduction that he first began keeping a journal out of anger at his wife's delay in seeking medical help when she first recognized a problem, but that his view was more understanding as time passed after her death. His compassion for her and forgiveness, both of her and of his own anger over her death, shine through this wonderful work. The book makes clear the importance of humor and fun and living life in the face of death, making every possible minute a recognition of the gift life is.



2. Finally a book written by one who fought alongside a loved one during that loved one's battle with cancer.
   
   Alvin F. Oickle's journal records for himself and his readers his odyssey with his wife from the time the original diagnosis of colon cancer was made until Irene's untimely death from the disease. Oickle begins by saying that this journal was begun in anger. No doubt the grieving process begins well before the actual death occurs.
   
   Along the way the reader gets a glimpse into Oickle's psyche as he valliantly battles at his wife's side. His anger, his hope, his joy, his frustration are all laid out.
   
   This is a book anyone struggling with dealing with a terminal illness of a loved one ought to read. The emotions that Oickle feels and shares are common among those watching a loved one die. The hope and advice Oickle gives is priceless.

No comments about A Menopausal Memoir: Letters from Another Climate (Haworth Innovations in Feminist Studies) (Haworth Innovations in Feminist Studies).

No comments about I'm Dying and You Don't Know What to Say.

No comments about Dancing at the River's Edge: A Patient and Her Doctor Negotiate Life with Chronic Illness.

No comments about Inspiring Science: Jim Watson and the Age of DNA.