Cell

I downloaded this book from Amazon onto my iPad within minutes of hearing Dr. Cooke's interview by Dr. Topol. Download took less than a minute, and then I was reading, with 6.5 hours to completion indicated at the bottom of the screen. Now forty years out of medical school myself, I have spent some time wondering what the medical students of today need to learn. Even though this work is fiction, it does point out that mastery of electronically accessible medical knowledge is a vital skill that all physicians must have. Not surprisingly, making rounds these days is a daunting task for older physicians, when trainees have instant access to all textbooks and other information and the dexterity to find it on the fly. But access to infinite stores of information does not translate automatically into clinical judgement, and the question remains of how tomorrow's physicians will make that translation. As "Cell" illustrates, the translation may not be made by corporate or governmental strategies, where huge financial interests will inevitably distort the relationship between caregiver, patient and intervention. Data systems can provide consistency of management strategies, accuracy of dosage, permanency of historical data, and improved communication between team members. But until perfection of software and hardware is obtained, the careful oversight of a trained clinician monitoring the interface between patient and the entire set of medical capabilities available will remain essential in assuring that the essential maxim, primum non nocere, is met. Indeed, whereas the corporate interests in "Cell" pushed to eliminate the human primary physician, the availability of universal data systems coupled with powerful pharmaceutical and surgical interventions will actually require even more oversight by knowledgeable, compassionate, and empathetic physicians. And the complexity of interventions, coupled with a need to filter advertising claims based on a clear statistical understanding of benefit and risk, suggest that this oversight role should be filled by the most highly trained member of the team, the expert physician. How will medical students be prepared for this daunting role, standing between patient and machine, patient and drug, patient and surgeon, or patient and data system? This question is the primary one that our medical schools and training programs must answer. "Cell" points that that stakes are high, the potential for harm is great, and the challenges for tomorrows physicians enormous. Thank you, Dr. Cooke.

enjoyed many of this author's books. This one held my attention, it was a page turner and the subject is fascinating and terrifying....that being said, is there a sequel? I'm not sure how to interpret the end. Is it a comparison of life, in the sense that as far as AHC and insurance is concerned, there are no final conclusions or answers, that it's ongoing? I don't know, but disappointed at the conclusion, if that was one, was this a message to the public or an entertaining novel...maybe Obama care is so messed up that the answer to my own query is related to the same feeling as the end.... if so it worked. The AHC act is nothing more than handing insurance companies the keys to corruption and saying "here are your millions of passengers, safe driving, don't bother with the seatbelts".

Robin Cook is one of my favorite authors and this book is on par with his others. Five stars for an awesome story line.But, half the pages of the book are so light I can barely read the words. It seems the printer ran out of ink on every other page. It’s so distracting and having to sit under bright lighting just to get through it. I’m past the return date so suffering through. Lesson learned - Inspect your books on receipt! Zero stars for the awful printing.

It wasn't bad. I liked the IT angle although I feel as though this was kind of a super cop-out in places. I don't see how the problem was that big of a deal in beta testing, since I assume that patients die in other medical tests? So the ending was kind of silly. I'm thinking if it is true that people can die because of medicine then... you know, this isn't really a problem. Plus what was particularly dumb was that it gets resolved mid story, which makes most of this sound stupid in the end.I like the ideas. I do. I just don't see where the reader's payoff is. Is there going to be a follow-up book where we get some sort of closure or is this a real-life-ain't-pretty story where book fantasy reality doesn't take hold? I can't tell because the whole iDoc app is so fantastical it's crazy. Like from a technical standpoint I get what was trying to be made but they basically made an AI and said "Well, no one has ever questioned what would happen if we gave a computer the ability to make clinical choices about passionate things," presumably while walking past a theater playing 2001: A Space Odyssey.I guess my overall issue was that the medical knowledge is there but the technological aspects were just... lacking. Yes, if an app like this one existed, I agree this is something people would care about. They also would have gone through an extensive beta test for the technology and probably ironed out the issue beforehand... you know, like one of the hundreds of programmers might have said, "Hey, computers don't operate on human logic so what if a human choice needs to be made?" Because we do have ethics in computer science and IT. Also you'd think a doctor might've thought it up too, considering what the problem was.I'm just confused as to why the author picked medicine, which she seems great at, and threw in a sci-first angle that she just... ignored. If you're gonna basically create the Singularity in a medical form, why have it fixed in the middle of the book? Why end it on this cliffhanger ending that basically will amount to, "this isn't really a story, since people die almost all the time anyway," when you introduced such a fantastical app? Especially when you consider the low number of dead people, it's like... how was this even a story to start out with? I agree that all lives are sacred but when the business men were like "it's 12 out of 10,000" you get that that's a less than 1% failure that they found and fixed mid story, right? That's even with the wrong number of patients because I don't quite remember what the actual number is. We market things with higher chances of killing people for certain. Are we supposed to question whether or not it's a glitch or something? It's super confusing because the ending is so vague and Choose-Your-Own-Adventure like.It was sort of gripping to read but simultaneously boring. It was like... interesting when George was doing his job and running into oddities. I liked that. But everything else fell short. Like, introducing a love interest and then being like, "nah, instead this other love interest, forget this one that we spent two or three chapters developing very slightly." She was basically a human Chekhov's Gun. She wasn't even a red Herring, she literally showed up for no reason. I guess as a way to get George to witness another death? But she wasn't necessary. I liked how realistic George was, how he didn't catch on to being followed, how he trusted people he shouldn't have, how he seemed flawed in places-- but a lot of other characters only got kinda scrap deals when it came to character. Like I get that Clayton was the defacto bad guy for a portion of the story? But he had zero redeeming qualities for a dude who runs a hospital department. Paula's development? Great. Both female romantic interests? One was basically Jesus and an unused narrative device, the other was even less likeable than Clayton. It was weird.So like I said it's... OK.

I am working my way through Robin Cook’s books. They are all engrossing reading even with the irritation of truly unbelievable vents that happen to the protagonists. This is more than compensated for by the truth he includes in his books about things that are happening in the health care world. A lot of them very scary. Almost finished his whole catalogue and will miss reading them.

Méfiez- vous plutôt de l' "intelligence artificielle" et des consultations de médecins à distance, en particulier dans les systèmes d'assurance médicale....

robin cook once again brings a modern problem to his story, everyone who dies in this story has a medical app on their phones ,,,,,,and the plot begines, love cooks technical jargon and his timely concept of this medical app which does not seem far removed, now i live in canada where we have social medicine but if big business takes over the healthcare industry where "bottom line" profit is achieved at any cost............well you can take it from there,a good cottage or beach or vacation read,kind of chilling too.

An interesting novel from Robin Cook.It covered not only medical back ground but also psychological analysis.Really informative book which makes it a must read book

habe dieses Buch bestellt, inzwischen auch erhalten, aber noch nicht gelesen, da ich viele Bücher gleichzeitig bestellt habe. Alles wie erwartet - bin zufrieden