Limit search to available items
Book Cover
E-book
Author Atkins, Chloë G. K. (Chloë Gwyneth Katharine), 1965-

Title My imaginary illness : a journey into uncertainty and prejudice in medical diagnosis / Chloë G.K. Atkins ; with a clinical commentary by Brian David Hodges ; foreword by Bonnie Blair O'Connor
Published Ithaca : ILR Press/Cornell University Press, 2010

Copies

Description 1 online resource (xxxi, 212 pages)
Series The culture and politics of health care work. How patients think
Culture and politics of health care work. How patients think.
Contents Beginnings -- The original crisis -- Facing uncertainty -- Ontological apprehensions -- Diagnosis : conversion reaction -- Credo -- More paralysis and more psychological remedies -- A pyrrhic victory -- Becoming a pariah -- Fire! fire! -- Love in the midst of ruin -- Grasping at a diagnosis, hoping for a cure -- The crisis deepens -- Contemplating hemlock -- Icarus -- A crisis, American style -- Gravy
Summary At age twenty-one, Chloë Atkins began suffering from a mysterious illness, the symptoms of which rapidly worsened. Paralyzed for months at a time, she frequently required intubation and life support. She eventually became quadriplegic, dependent both on a wheelchair and on health professionals who refused to believe there was anything physically wrong with her. When test after test returned inconclusive results, Atkins's doctors pronounced her symptoms psychosomatic. Atkins was told not only that she was going to die but also that this was her own fault; they concluded she was so emotionally deranged that she was willing her own death. My Imaginary Illness is the compelling story of Atkins's decades-long battle with a disease deemed imaginary, her frustration with a succession of doctors and diagnoses, her immersion in the world of psychotherapy, and her excruciating physical and emotional journey back to wellness. As both a political theorist and patient, Atkins provides a narrative critique of contemporary medicine and its problematic handling of uncertainty and of symptoms that are not easily diagnosed or known. She convincingly illustrates that medicine's belief in evidence-based practice does not mean that individual doctors are capable of objectivity, nor that the presence of biomedical ethics invokes ethical practices in hospitals and clinics. A foreword by Bonnie Blair O'Connor, who teaches medical students how to listen to patients, and a clinical commentary by Dr. Brian David Hodges, a professor of psychiatry, enrich the book's narrative with practical guidance for medical practitioners and patients alike
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes In English
Print version record
Subject Myasthenia gravis -- Diagnosis
Somatic symptom disorder -- Diagnosis
Diagnosis -- Social aspects
Myasthenia Gravis -- diagnosis
Diagnostic Errors -- psychology
Somatoform Disorders -- diagnosis
Somatoform Disorders -- psychology
MEDICAL -- Diagnosis.
HEALTH & FITNESS -- Diseases -- General.
MEDICAL -- Clinical Medicine.
MEDICAL -- Diseases.
MEDICAL -- Evidence-Based Medicine.
MEDICAL -- Internal Medicine.
Diagnosis -- Social aspects
Genre/Form Autobiography
autobiographies (literary works)
Autobiographies
Autobiographies.
Autobiographies.
Form Electronic book
Author Hodges, Brian David, 1964-
LC no. 2010013374
ISBN 9780801459948
080145994X
0801459656
9780801459658