From Beverley Allitt, the attention-seeking nurse who preyed on the children in her care, to the infamous Dr Harold Shipman, who was responsible for the deaths of at least 218 of his patients, history has been littered with examples of healers who have done anything but. In a comprehensive study of violent crimes perpetrated by health care professionals, Davis offers valuable insights into 34 case studies involving doctors and nurses who have crossed the line from healer to killer. These in depth analyses include interviews with experts in the fields of mental health and criminology.
It would come as no surprise that many readers may be shocked and intrigued by the title of our book. Some (especially our medical colleagues) may wonder why it is even worthwhile to raise the issue of killing by doctors. Killing is clearly an- thetical to the Art and Science of Medicine, which is geared toward easing pain and suffering and to saving lives rather than smothering them. Doctors should be a source of comfort rather than a cause for alarm. Nevertheless, although they often don’t want to admit it, doctors are people too. Physicians have the same genetic library of both endearing qualities and character defects as the rest of us but their vocation places them in a position to intimately interject themselves into the lives of other people. In most cases, fortunately, the positive traits are dominant and doctors do more good than harm. While physicists and mathematicians paved the road to the stars and deciphered the mysteries of the atom, they simultaneously unleashed destructive powers that may one day bring about the annihilation of our planet. Concurrently, doctors and allied scientists have delved into the deep secrets of the body and mind, mastering the anatomy and physiology of the human body, even mapping the very molecules that make us who we are. But make no mistake, a person is not simply an elegant b- logical machine to be marveled at then dissected.
Behind the Murder Curtain is the true story of Bruce Sackman, Special Agent in Charge of the Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Inspector General. Sackman’s main responsibilities had been investigating white-collar crimes such as embezzlement when he is drawn into the macabre world of doctors and nurses who murder their patients. Sackman evolves from an investigator of routine cases to the world’s leading expert on Medical Serial Killers—MSKs—doctors and nurses who ply their evil trade hidden behind the privacy curtain at a patient’s bedside. Behind the Murder Curtain tells how this dedicated investigator brought down four MSKs in Veterans Hospitals while developing the RED FLAGS PROTOCOL, which is now taught to investigators and forensic nurses throughout the world as a tool for stopping an MSK.
The author of "Den of Thieves" traces the path of Michael Swango--who seemed a model young doctor until his patients began dying in suspicious circumstances. The doctor is thought by the FBI to be the most successful serial killer in the nation's history. Second serial to New York "Daily News".
This oft-quoted all-time favorite of the medical community will gladden--and strengthen--the hearts of patients, doctors, and anyone entering medical study, internship, or practice. With unassailable logic and rapier wit, the sage Dr. Oscar London muses on the challenges and joys of doctoring, and imparts timeless truths, reality checks, and poignant insights gleaned from 30 years of general practice--while never taking himself (or his profession) too seriously. The classic book on the art and humor of practicing medicine, celebrating its 20th anniversary in a new gift edition with updates throughout. Previous editions have sold more than 200,000 copies. The perfect gift for med students and grads as well as new and practicing physicians. Approximately 17,000 students graduate from med school each spring in North America.
In this true story—a haunting saga of medical murder set in an era of steamships and gaslights—Gregg Olsen reveals one of the most unusual and disturbing criminal cases in American history. In 1911 two wealthy British heiresses, Claire and Dora Williamson, arrived at a sanitorium in the forests of the Pacific Northwest to undergo the revolutionary “fasting treatment” of Dr. Linda Burfield Hazzard. It was supposed to be a holiday for the two sisters, but within a month of arriving at what the locals called Starvation Heights, the women underwent brutal treatments and were emaciated shadows of their former selves. Claire and Dora were not the first victims of Linda Hazzard, a quack doctor of extraordinary evil and greed. But as their jewelry disappeared and forged bank drafts began transferring their wealth to Hazzard’s accounts, the sisters came to learn that Hazzard would stop at nothing short of murder to achieve her ambitions.
The lives and dreadful deeds of 20 horrific medical serial killers, including: Genene Jones: a truly monstrous paediatric nurse who murdered as many as 47 babies and children entrusted to her care. Glennon Engleman:a rather unconventional dentist who moonlighted as a hitman and murder-for-profit killer. Michael Swango: a deadly doctor who took genuine pleasure in poisoning his patients and colleagues. Killed at least 60 in an intercontinental murder spree. The Lainz Angels of Death: four lethal nurses who turned the geriatric ward at an Austrian hospital into their private killing field. Gwendolyn Graham & Cathy Wood: lesbian lovers who got their kicks by suffocating the elderly patients under their care. Teet Haerm: police pathologist who spent his nights hunting prostitutes in Stockholm, Sweden. Haerm actually performed autopsies on many of the women he'd killed. Orville Lynn Majors: an ICU nurse with a deep-seated hatred for his elderly patients, Majors is suspected of over 100 murders. Kimberly Saenz: addicted to prescription drugs and with her life falling apart around her, Saenz struck out at helpless patients, injecting them with bleach. Donald Harvey: dubbed the "Angel of Death," Harvey killed at least seventy hospital patients by suffocation, poisoning, drug overdoses and other methods. Thomas Neill Cream: London's East End had barely recovered from Jack the Ripper when Dr. Cream arrived on the scene, dispensing agonizing death with his special little pills. Plus 10 more sensational true crime cases
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The award-winning book that inspired an Apple Original series from Apple TV+ • A landmark investigation of patient deaths at a New Orleans hospital ravaged by Hurricane Katrina—and the suspenseful portrayal of the quest for truth and justice—from a Pulitzer Prize–winning physician and reporter “An amazing tale, as inexorable as a Greek tragedy and as gripping as a whodunit.”—Dallas Morning News After Hurricane Katrina struck and power failed, amid rising floodwaters and heat, exhausted staff at Memorial Medical Center designated certain patients last for rescue. Months later, a doctor and two nurses were arrested and accused of injecting some of those patients with life-ending drugs. Five Days at Memorial, the culmination of six years of reporting by Pulitzer Prize winner Sheri Fink, unspools the mystery, bringing us inside a hospital fighting for its life and into the most charged questions in health care: which patients should be prioritized, and can health care professionals ever be excused for hastening death? Transforming our understanding of human nature in crisis, Five Days at Memorial exposes the hidden dilemmas of end-of-life care and reveals how ill-prepared we are for large-scale disasters—and how we can do better. ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review • ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Chicago Tribune, Seattle Times, Entertainment Weekly, Christian Science Monitor, Kansas City Star WINNER: National Book Critics Circle Award, J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize, PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award, Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Ridenhour Book Prize, American Medical Writers Association Medical Book Award, National Association of Science Writers Science in Society Award
Serial killers in the caring professions. Doctors, nurses and health workers have a duty of care to their patients to ensure they act in the best interests of an individual; and not act or fail to act in a way that results in harm. But those featured within these pages are serial killers who roamed their places of work, preying on people at their most vulnerable. Angels of Death is an updated collection of real life crimes exploring murders committed in hospitals and doctors' surgeries - the very places where lives are supposed to be healed or saved. The accounts also include cases where the murderers struck in places that are meant to be safe havens, like aged care homes and even people's living rooms. These disturbing crimes take place in Australia, the United Kingdom, the USA, Canada and Europe. Emily Webb is a journalist and author, specialising in true crime. She co-hosts the popular podcast Australian True Crime.
