Book Review – This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay
First published, 2017

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

Loved it. My word, how I loved this book.

There’s no question that junior doctors are superheroes. They survive on practically no sleep, they never get cover, and they have to know every inch of every medical condition they might encounter. Plus a few others, over drinks and dinner, with partners and friends they never see.

I loved the dark humour running through this book, which is, ostensibly, a few years in the life of a junior doctor, complete with diary entries and footnotes (on what medical conditions and apparatus actually are – for the non-medical among us.)

One of my favourite parts was a footnotes about a myomectomy. Having had one myself, I chuckled, felt ill, giggled again, at this:
“ * A myomectomy is the removal of fibroids – benign swirls of growth in the muscle of the uterus that you remove using what is essentially a corkscrew.”
This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay, page 42, footnote.

There are some truly hilarious stories in here. I laughed out loud a lot. But there are also devastating stories which made me feel nothing but compassion for everyone who works in the NHS.

Go, read, now.

UK: https://amzn.to/2Zudn3g