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King of Hearts
- The True Story of the Maverick Who Pioneered Open Heart Surgery
- Narrated by: Patrick Cullen
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
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Publisher's summary
Few of the great stories of medicine are as palpably dramatic as the advent of open heart surgery, yet until now, no journalist has ever brought to life all of the thrilling specifics of this triumph. G. Wayne Miller tells the story of Dr. C. Walton Lillehei, who, along with colleagues at University Hospital in Minneapolis and a small band of pioneers elsewhere, accomplished what many experts considered to be an impossible feat: he opened the heart, repaired fatal defects, and made the miraculous routine.
Miller draws on archival research and exclusive interviews with Lillehei and legendary pioneers such as Michael DeBakey and Christiaan Barnard, taking readers into the lives of these doctors and their patients as they progress toward their landmark achievement. Beginning in the 1950s with highly unorthodox operations simultaneously on two people - experiments that in today's political climate might not be possible - Lillehei and his colleagues took risks that resulted in rivers of blood and cost the lives of several early patients. But ultimately this is a story of triumph: King of Hearts is a true life-and-death drama about the surgeons who risked their reputations, and the patients who risked their lives, to revolutionize health care.
Critic reviews
"Miller skillfully describes the years of research that finally led Lillehei to his first cross-circulation operation on a human...a sturdy telling.'' (Boston Globe)
Highly recommended for all readers, particularly those who owe their lives to Lillehei's path-breaking research." (Library Journal)
"Written with clarity, simplicity, and grace." (Associated Press)
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Story
Like so many of us, award-winning writer Katy Butler always assumed her aging parents would experience healthy, active retirements before dying peacefully at home. Then her father suffered a stroke that left him incapable of easily finishing a sentence or showering without assistance. Her mother was thrust into full-time caregiving, and Katy became one of the 24 million Americans who help care for aging parents. In an effort to correct a minor and non - life threatening heart arrhythmia, doctors outfitted her father with a pacemaker.
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A better way to narrate a book about death?
- By MAUREEN on 10-21-13
By: Katy Butler
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Charlatan
- America's Most Dangerous Huckster, the Man Who Pursued Him and the Age of Flimflam
- By: Pope Brock
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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This is the enormously entertaining story of how a fraudulent surgeon made a fortune by inserting goats' testes into impotent American men. "Doctor" John Brinkley became a world renowned authority on sexual rejuvenation in the 1920s, with famous politicians and even royalty asking for his services.
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nix the narrator
- By susan nenadic on 02-08-09
By: Pope Brock
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Healing Hearts
- A Memoir of a Female Heart Surgeon
- By: Kathy Magliato
- Narrated by: Renée Raudman
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Dr. Kathy Magliato is one of fewer than a dozen female heart surgeons practicing in the world today. She is also a member of an even more exclusive group - those surgeons who perform heart transplants. Healing Hearts is the story of the making of a surgeon who also calls herself a wife and mother.
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Healing Hearts
- By Jean on 01-14-12
By: Kathy Magliato
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The Undead
- Organ Harvesting, The Ice-Water Test, Beating Heart Cadavers - How Medicine Is Blurring the Line Between Life and Death
- By: Dick Teresi
- Narrated by: David Marantz
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Important and provocative, The Undead examines why even with the tools of advanced technology, what we think of as life and death, consciousness and nonconsciousness, is not exactly clear - and how this problem has been further complicated by the business of organ harvesting.
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Eye opening
- By Amy Giglio on 07-01-18
By: Dick Teresi
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Your Heart, My Hands
- An Immigrant's Remarkable Journey to Become One of America's Preeminent Cardiac Surgeons
- By: Arun K. Singh MD, John Hanc - contributor, Delos Cosgrove MD - foreword
- Narrated by: Shridhar Solanki
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Leaving a life marked by crippling setbacks and his father's doubt, in 1967 a 20-something doctor from India arrived in America with only five dollars and the desire to claim his American dream. Faced with an entirely new culture, racism, and the lasting effects of disabling childhood injuries, through hard work and perseverance he overcame all odds. Now having performed over 15,000 open-heart surgeries, more than nearly every surgeon in history, Dr. Singh reflects on his most memorable patients and his incredible personal life.
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Remarkable!
- By Stacey on 12-01-22
By: Arun K. Singh MD, and others
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Final Exam
- A Surgeon's Reflections on Mortality
- By: Pauline W. Chen
- Narrated by: Pauline W. Chen
- Length: 6 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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When Pauline Chen began medical school 20 years ago, she dreamed of saving lives. What she did not count on was how much death would be a part of her work. Almost immediately, Chen found herself wrestling with medicine's most profound paradox: that a profession premised on caring for the ill also systematically depersonalizes dying. Final Exam follows Chen over the course of her education, training, and practice as she grapples at strikingly close range with the problem of mortality.
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Not just about end of life
- By Paul Mullen on 03-25-07
By: Pauline W. Chen
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Asleep
- The Forgotten Epidemic That Became Medicine’s Greatest Mystery
- By: Molly Caldwell Crosby
- Narrated by: Christian Rummel
- Length: 6 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1918, a world war raged, and a lethal strain of influenza circled the globe. In the midst of all this death, a bizarre disease appeared in Europe. Eventually known as encephalitis lethargica, or sleeping sickness, it spread worldwide, leaving millions dead or locked in institutions. Then, in 1927, it disappeared as suddenly as it had arrived. Asleep, set in 1920s and '30s New York, follows a group of neurologists through hospitals and asylums as they try to solve this epidemic and treat its victims - who learned the worst fate was not dying of it, but surviving it.
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Scary, and still unsolved, medical mystery
- By joyce on 12-14-14
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Doctored
- The Disillusionment of an American Physician
- By: Sandeep Jauhar
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Hoping for the stability he needs to start a family, Sandeep Jauhar, an attending cardiologist, accepts a position at a massive teaching hospital on the outskirts of Queens. With a decade's worth of elite medical training behind him, he is eager to settle down and reap the rewards of countless sleepless nights. Instead, he is confronted with sobering truths. Doctors' morale is low and getting lower.
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Frank, inside perspective on the follies of unintended consequences in medical reform
- By Jared T Wilsey on 02-25-18
By: Sandeep Jauhar
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The Desperate Hours
- One Hospital's Fight to Save a City on the Pandemic's Front Lines
- By: Marie Brenner
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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In the spring of 2020, COVID-19 arrived in New York City. Before long, America’s largest metropolis was at war against a virus that mercilessly swept through its five boroughs. In The Desperate Hours, award-winning journalist Marie Brenner, having been granted unprecedented 18-month access to the entire New York-Presbyterian hospital system, tells the story of the doctors, nurses, residents, researchers, and suppliers who tried to save lives across Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn and the northern periphery of the city.
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Way too much politics
- By Josh on 07-18-22
By: Marie Brenner
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When Breath Becomes Air
- By: Paul Kalanithi, Abraham Verghese - foreword
- Narrated by: Sunil Malhotra, Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 5 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated.
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Phenomenal book!
- By A. Potter on 01-16-16
By: Paul Kalanithi, and others
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One Doctor
- Close Calls, Cold Cases, and the Mysteries of Medicine
- By: Brendan Reilly
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 15 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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An epic story told by a unique voice in American medicine, One Doctor describes life-changing experiences in the career of a distinguished physician. In riveting first-person prose, Dr. Brendan Reilly takes us to the front lines of medicine today.
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Simply Brilliant
- By Jan on 06-20-14
By: Brendan Reilly
What listeners say about King of Hearts
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Roger
- 01-01-11
Amazing Story
This is an amazing story about the invention of open heart surgery and the artificial heart. Highly recommend that everyone listen to this, as well as Splendid Solution on the invention of the polio vaccine.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Tony Yao
- 01-01-17
Odd chapter layout for audiobook
Fantastic book overall. My only gripe is that the book chapters don't get their own audio book chapters. Seemed odd for me, and could be potentially confusing if I wanted to go back to a particular part of the book.
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- Teresita Farkas
- 06-09-17
very informative and unforgettable
I had no idea how open heart surgery developed and now I will never forget.
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- Brian
- 02-05-08
Loved every minute
This is the amazing story of the development of the first open heart surgery in the 1950's. The medical background is easy enough for a non-medical person to understand but remains highly engaging even for a medical professional. I am a medical history enthusiast and this book goes right near the top of the list and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys understanding how scientific and medical breakthroughs occur. Perhaps the only book I enjoyed more was "The Mold in Dr. Florey's Coat" chronicling the development of penicillin.
King of Hearts is a great book and I would highly recommend it to anyone.
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Russ
- 11-10-03
Fascinating Book
This book was excellent. The narration was superb. The story was interesting and captivating. This story exemplifies the idea that fact can be more intriguing than fiction.
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3 people found this helpful
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- LM
- 01-09-17
Great book, great narrator.
I fully recommend this book to anyone interested in heart surgery or cardiovascular perfusion. It details, with clear description, the interesting story surrounding heart surgery and the journey to its perfection. Very well-written and interesting throughout. The narrator has a pleasant voice which (uncommon for me) I found to actually improve the character of the story.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Lori
- 06-23-21
Loved it
I rarely read/listen to books of this kind. I was recommended this book by Dr. Barr of USC Keck Medical and I was pleasantly surprised on how much I enjoyed this book and how much I learned of the history of cardiology and its progression. While it wasn't so complex in the medical terminology so as to make it easier for non-medical professionals to understand, it was enjoyable nonetheless.
I definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes to learn about new things and of the history of lesser known progressions of human history.
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- Customer
- 04-22-23
Great read
A captivating account of one of the greatest pioneers of open-heart surgery. Well performed and very entertaining. Highly recommended.
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- Nicholas Bentley
- 03-16-04
Great narration!
Great story, but what I want to say is: great narration! First American narrator I've found who has a sense of pace and does not find every word of every sentence freighted with meaning. I'm sorry if that sounds un-American because I am one, but I'm constantly looking for books narrated by Brits. Or, from now on, Patrick Cullen.
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6 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Satoru
- 11-16-04
motivated
if you're a medical student this book is a must listen.this book motivated me to a great extent.now we can learn how to practice open heart surgeries with books and ive never wondered who did it first.this story was so enlightening that i decided to specialize in cardiovasculolgy in the future.
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2 people found this helpful