The medical detectives
by Berton Roueché · first published 1900
7mentions
4recommended by
6HN commenters
2010–2023first – last mentioned
67% recommend33% neutral
In each true story, local health authorities and epidemiologists race against time to find the clue to an unknown and possibly fatal disease.
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I'm very sorry to hear about your problem. I hope you keep investigating and find out what it is. If you haven't read it yet, maybe "The Medical Detectives" could inspire you. Jon Bentley said that it was the best debugging book he ever read. http://www.amazon.com/Medical-Detectives-Truman-Talley/dp/04...
on “Save My Life - help a fellow HN'er” ↗Yes, absolutely. If you like House (for the medical mystery aspect rather than the snark), you may also like Berton Roueche's writing. _The Medical Detectives_ is a pretty good collection.
on “You Owe it to Yourself to be Old-School” ↗I have the book mentioned at the end, _The Medical Detectives_, by Berton Rouechè, and it is full of fascinating stories - highly recommended.
on “Debugging – Section 5.10 of Programming Pearls” ↗Funny... that reminds me that in 'Programming Pearls' (http://netlib.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/pearls/) Jon Bentley recommends the book 'The Medical Detectives' by Berton Roueche, as both entertaining and instructive for the kind of lateral thinking needed to debug.
on “What is it like to be a mathematician?” ↗You just jogged my memory about a "tomato transplant mystery" in Berton Roueche's Medical Detectives. Link to a summary of the original 1965 New Yorker essay: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1965/05/15/something-a-li...
on “Tree of Forty Fruit” ↗…more detailed popular examination of the engineering and management effort behind the Apollo program, and they spend some time on the 'back room' of engineers depicted in the film. I'm reminded of 'The Medical Detectives', Roueche, but only by reputation (I own a copy I haven't read.) "In each true story, local health authorities and epidemiologists race against time to find the clue to an unknown and possibly fatal disease."…
on “Ask HN: Literature on crisis response?” ↗> The medical community is a joke I've been reading "The Medical Detectives" and it seems like there used to be a stronger drive to seek understanding of the unheard.
on “End-of-Life Dreams” ↗