"God's Hotel: A Doctor's Journey to Lourdes and the Miraculous Healing Power of Faith"

Jenifer Ehreth: What a surprise. This book was recommended and with the title, I almost passed on it. I understand the title’s rationale but, while it is personally satisfying, given I lived within blocks of the hospital the book was named after, a better title could have been found. I have recommended it to a few young medical people who would never know how patients could and should be treated using techniques mostly lost with the emphasis on technology and quick turnover. An important book.

United States on Dec 18, 2023

Semolina: Book received in as described condition. Very happy 😁

United Kingdom on Dec 16, 2023

Donna Cline: A great book for anyone interested in health care and changes made to delivering of care in recent years due to “modernization” and regulations. It is not a dull story and it happened at a hospital in San Francisco, CA. I highly recommend this book.

United States on Dec 10, 2023

L F: Really enjoyed this memoir of a Dr’s personal and professional journey. It’s so refreshing to hear from someone who has wrestled through what works and doesn’t with both modern and pre-modern methods and ideologies. A reminder that progress doesn’t have to throw out the baby with the bath water as far as what has worked before. I believe we are coming to realize as a society that maybe industrialism and efficiency have taken as much as they have given. (Some reviews had issue with her using patient and colleague names in the book - she does make a note that all the names she used were pseudonyms. It’s important to read the whole book!).

Canada on Oct 20, 2020

Joanne Johnson: Fascinating. At first, I thought I would not get into it .... I am squeamish ... sigh ... but I carried on, and I am so very, very glad I did. The author's knowledge, perceptions, etc., re modern medicine are interesting. I really like this gal, and would love it if she were my doc. She produced a very entertaining and informative read, however, the book needed good editing. There were the occasional redundancies ... she would start a paragraph with a statement, follow it up with the background to support her original statement, and then finish the paragraph stating exactly what she had said at the beginning of the paragraph. Also, the book included many incomplete sentences. Although none of this detracted from her basic message, for me, it did detract from the work in its entirety. I kept going back to say, "Huh, didn't she just say that? Huh, didn't she just say that in an incomplete sentence?" Minor quibbles, for sure, but then why should I have had to quibble at all? I do not have an English degree, but these things definitely jumped out at me. In any event, it was a good read, provides much food for thought, and I do recommended it.

United States on Feb 21, 2016

Fulya: Although the use of language was quite good and some stories were interesting, this book is nothing more than a simple diary of a doctor. Most importantly even it lacks the emotions that should exist in a diary.

Germany on Jan 27, 2016

npdy: Una profesional de la medicina plenamente cualificada cuestiona los criterios de eficiencia y eficacia al uso en los sistemas sanitarios occidentales, desde su experiencia de largos años en una institución "benéfica" más allá de la primera acepción del término. El estilo narrativo es el relato sencillo, directo y ameno, pero también plagado de opiniones y reflexiones. Debería traducirse.

Spain on Oct 20, 2015

mindriots: A beautiful book for nurses, doctors, healthcare professionals, and patients alike. One of the best books I have read in a long time. Victoria Sweet sucks you in; you become part of her world in the hospital, and can see everything she describes. It is a moving, compelling, and wonderfully human read. It is also pretty heart-breaking to read about the bureaucratic nonsense that governs healthcare and that ultimately wins out because, as we all know, money usually does. She gets to the heart of it all, and she does it with such poise and grace in her writing and interpretation of situations and encounters that both makes me happy that she is a Physician, and sad that there aren't more like her.

I am so happy Dr. Sweet wrote this book; it is so accessible. She writes with understanding and compassion, and as someone who seems to *get* it, rationally and realistically speaking. She describes so perfectly one of the fundamental problems of north american healthcare: lack of time. Taking away time destroys the ability to give optimal healthcare, and she captures this perfectly.

As Dr. Sweet finds herself doing with Hildegard of Bingen, I now find myself...

Canada on Feb 13, 2013

Dr Ali Binazir: A book that can delight you through its entertainments or instruct you with useful knowledge is a good book; one that does both is a great book. Rarely, a book comes along that not only instructs and delights but also deepens your humanity, carving out extra space inside us to carry even more compassion. 'God's Hotel' is such a book. [A hat-tip to Jesse Kornbluth of Head Butler for introducing me to it.]

There were many reasons I enjoyed the book, which is really many books at once:

-- The author, Dr Victoria Sweet, who has a PhD in medieval history as well as an MD, shares the ancient Latin and Greek etymologies of many terms used in patient care today. Hospitality, community, charity - what do they really mean? Through her stories about her time taking care of patients, Dr Sweet shows how those formed the three foundational principles of Laguna Honda Hospital.

-- Dr Sweet interweaves the account of her doctoral research on Hildegard von Bingen in the story. Von Bingen was the original 11th century superwoman: head cleric, builder, farmer, physician, author *and* composer at a time when women weren't allowed much power at all. Dr Sweet...

United States on Nov 14, 2012