Fallibility By Atul Gawande Analysis

Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science “Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science” is a book full of stories from Dr. Atul Gawande’s medical residency. In this book, he tells some of his most traumatic and intense stories from a surgeon’s point of view. He explains the need for good decision making skills, judgment, and the importance of education in an important career. His stories are very inspiring and fascinating. Complications lays bare a science not in its idealized form but as it actually is uncertain, perplexing, and profoundly human.
In the first section of the book, “Fallibility,” Gawande provides a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the operating theatre that lays bare the “imperfect science” that is surgery. He sheds light on the error-prone nature of medicine through recollections of real-life cases in the wards and operating theatre the orthopedic surgeon who amputates the wrong limb; the long-respected yet burned-out doctor who suddenly loses his touch; and the young resident who forgets to remove a surgical sponge from inside the patient. Gawande confesses his own mistakes too, from his failed attempts learning how to place a central venous catheter line for the first time, to his emergency tracheotomy crisis scenario
Life-and-death decisions are often made in the spur of the moment, based on the “gut feeling” of the doctor rather than concrete evidence found in medical literature. The power of intuition is illustrated in the case of a young girl who presented a rash on her leg. First diagnosed as cellulitis, the rash was later tested positive for flesh-eating bacteria, an incredibly rare yet aggressive infection that is almost impossible to detect in time. So what spurred the decision to order the test? Gawande had a creeping suspicion—a suspicion that ended up sparing a young girl’s