From Plastic Surgery Practice Magazine:
Even Doctors Cry–Love, Death, Scandal and a Terribly Flawed Medical System (Langdon Street Press, 2010), by Alvin Reiter MD, veers off into what is for me very interesting territory: a successful Beverly Hills plastic surgeon who was diagnosed with incurable Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma and given less than a 40% chance of living 6 years, while his wife was diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer in 1999 and given a 95% chance of a total cure. He became her full-time caregiver, quit his practice, and she died 3 years later after the worst possible medical care imaginable, which he documents. It is a beautifully written story told from the heart.
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A Potent and Scathing Indictment of our Medical System from a Longstanding Member of the Medical Establishment
EVEN DOCTORS CRY
Love, Death, Scandal and a Terribly Flawed Medical System
A Beverly Hills Plastic Surgeon’s Story
Alvin Reiter, MD
Early in his medical career, one of his mentors told Alvin Reiter, “This patient may only have a one in forty chance of surviving the cancer, but you do not know if you have that particular one in forty patient under your knife. Do all you can despite the odds, no matter how hopeless a case may be. The patient has put his life in your hands.” These words had a deep impact on Dr. Reiter. Ironically—and tragically—these same words came back to haunt him as he encountered first-hand, doctors that did not embrace this worthy philosophy. Even Doctors Cry: Love, Death, Scandal and a Terribly Flawed Medical System – A Beverly Hills Plastic Surgeon’s Story ($14.95 paperback) is Dr. Reiter’s account of his beloved wife’s premature demise that was preceded by appalling medical mistreatment. Part love story, part memoir, and wholly a call to action, this is a disturbing cautionary tale rife with misdiagnoses and negligence at the hands of some of the nation’s most esteemed doctors and respected hospitals.
Karen Reiter was diagnosed with early breast cancer and given a 95% chance of total cure. The cancer quickly spread, eventually invading her liver. With her husband as her advocate, Karen bravely and proactively fought the disease, but nonetheless succumbed to metastatic breast cancer.
As part of the medical elite, Dr. Reiter admits he had foolishly put his faith in a system he thought he could trust. He had also been influenced by his own successful battle with cancer when, diagnosed with incurable Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, he was given less than a 40% chance of surviving six years. While his treatment was not free from the indignities of a flawed medical system, its success softened the negative memories. Today, Dr. Reiter is a fifteen-year survivor, with his cancer in complete remission.
In the midst of his own cancer battle, Dr. Reiter endured another injustice that would permanently taint his view of his chosen profession. He describes how he was made a pawn at the hands of some of the colleagues he had most respected, in an investigation by the FBI at one of the facilities where he performed his surgeries. After a legal battle which reads like L.A. LAW, and faced with the onset of Karen’s disease, he was forced to reevaluate his place in the medical establishment.
With Even Doctors Cry, Dr. Reiter takes a brave stance against his own profession in the hope of inspiring reform to a system that is terribly–indeed, fatally– broken. Daring to ask the tough questions about a medical system that can fail even those who are an integral part of it, this heartfelt, controversial book is a wake-up call for patients and doctors alike.
EVEN DOCTORS CRY: Love, Death, Scandal and a Terribly Flawed Medical System—A Beverly Hills Plastic Surgeon’s Story
By Alvin Reiter, MD
Langdon Street Press
Publication date: June 2010
366 pages, ISBN 978-1-936183-05-0, $14.95 paperback
www.evendoctorscry.com
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