Becoming a Doctor

"Professor Chris Ward has spent a lifetime finding ways to help his patients flourish in the face of extraordinary disability and suffering. His book explores the difficulties and the rewards of this work, and pours decades of thoughtful reflection into just a few pages. For patients, it will change the way they think about medicine, science and rehabilitation for the better; for clinicians, it's an imaginative inspiration and will prove a precious resource." -Gavin Francis, General Practitioner, Author of Recovery: The Lost Art of Convalescence.

"This shrewd and humane palaeobiography of becoming a doctor - personal but universal, dense but luminous - is utterly enthralling and deeply discerning. It traces the metamorphosis of a medical student of the 1960s into an astute retrospectator of what it is to be a doctor and to do doctoring through 50 years of momentous professional change and personal transformation." -Lawrence Trevelyan Weaver, Emeritus Professor of Child Health, University of Glasgow, author of White Blood - A History of Human Milk.

"Becoming a Doctor is a splendid book - nuanced and erudite, wry and humane, wise and narratively compelling. It can be read from beginning to end or dipped into like a generous box of chocolates. I savoured it and learned a great deal from it. It will reward a wide readership - from medical educators and students to anyone curious about the making of a doctor." -Kevin Harvey, Associate Professor, author of The Literary Lifeline, School of English, University of Nottingham, UK.