I did not know what to expect when I read “Better: Surgeon’s Notes on Performance.”  But — as captured in a book report I prepared for a class — I now feel a deeper respect for the medical profession that may have been more superficial in the past.  I also have an acute awareness that this is a complex profession that only medical professionals can deeply and truly understand.

The message that Gawande injects to the reader, regardless of profession, is that performance does not have to be a home-run all the time.  Although I do like swinging for the fences from time to time. The inability to perform medicine uniformly today is exactly the challenge that we have today because of the bell curve.  But, as Gawande asserts, if we can maximize the science that is available to us today and couple that with treating each patient as an individual who deserves that best care, we may just then be able to minimize ineptitude and be “better” in the process. 

If Gawande’s objective was to nurture empathy for the medicine profession by non-clinicians and push us to strive to do better regardless of profession, I believe we can say with certainty mission accomplished. 

If you have not read the book, I highly recommend it; conversely, check out the video where he talks about the book to Google employees.