Between Expectations: Lessons from a Pediatric Residency

It's a given that doctors-in-training will suffer through sleep deprivation and stress, but pediatrician Weir brings something more heartfelt—and joyful—to this achingly personal chronicle of her residency at Children's Hospital Boston and Boston Medical Center. Weir's grim introduction to Connor, a fragile preemie, forces her to wonder whether "the ends will justif[y] even the most agonizing means." There is her anger at baby Myranda's drug-addicted mother, her panic over blue-baby Briony, her struggles to tell 19-year-old Harry's father that his son has a brain tumor, and her realization that when you don't know what to do, you should know whom to call. The most memorable parts of Weir's grueling training are the complicated kids and families, the hope she inspires in them—and the hope they give her in turn. Yet, she shows, doctors working with very sick children must know when they're offering families too much hope, or not enough, and that there's a cost to everything they do. Here's a white coat insider's account with better writing and more soul than most medical dramas. (Mar.)