Surgeon!: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Doctor

Poverty and ignorance often cause or aggravate medical problems that afflict the slum dwellers described by Caleela dedicated, compassionate physicianin a book based on a journal written during the 1960s that covers his first year as a young doctor in charge of surgery at a Chicago hospital. Assisted by Littell (The Predators, etc.), he recalls a wide range of cases from tumors and heart by-pass operations to burns on an abused child, knifing and shooting victims, junkies and prostitutes. His caseload often reached 12 surgical procedures a day, many of them recounted in some detail. Most poignant is the account of his own infant son's battle to overcome a congenital defect. Caleel, who has also participated in rescue missions in Africa and Southeast Asia, cites lack of preventive care, mistrust and poor communication between patient and doctor as the chief obstacles in treating ghetto patients. (October)