University of Massachusetts Medical Center, Worcester, MA 01655.
R Campo. 122 pages. Durham: Duke Univ Pr; 1996. $12.95. ISBN 0-8223-1742-7. Order phone 919-687-3600.
The perfect opener for grand rounds or a patient care conference would be the poem titled "Ten Patients, and Another," terse case studies that, in a very few incisive words (as only poetry can do), encapsulate what the charts document and what they leave out: The patients, "a three-year-old-black male … [who] ingested what's turned out to be/Cocaine," "a sixty-odd-year-old/white female … The intern found a bruise behind her ear," "a gay Latino kid … getting tubed for respiratory failure … whispered that he's lost the will to live./He pawned his crucifix to get the pills," "a twelve-year-old white female … gravida zero, no STDs./She's never even had a pelvic … says it was/her dad. He's sitting in the waiting room." What their bodies tell, what the patients say, what the skillful practitioner intuits, are masterfully fleshed out by a poet who speaks from his own experience and identity as a gay, Cuban-American practicing physician.
Published: Ann Intern Med. 1996;125(12):1024.