Your Life In My Hands: A Junior Doctor's Story

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The course of my life is in Your power; deliver me from the power of my enemies and from my persecutors. This book has also allowed me to see that medicine is essentially inseparable from politics. No matter how much doctors wish to be independent, they still fall under the subjugation of government bureaucracy and their choices are still influenced by political imperatives.

The course of my life is in your power; rescue me from the power of my enemies and from my persecutors. Your Life in My Hands is at once a powerful polemic on the systematic degradation of Britain’s most vital public institution, and a love letter of optimism and hope to that same health service and those who support it. This extraordinary memoir offers a glimpse into a life spent between the operating room and the bedside, the mortuary and the doctors' mess, telling powerful truths about today’s NHS frontline, and capturing with tenderness and humanity the highs and lows of a new doctor’s first steps onto the wards in the context of a health service at breaking point - and what it means to be entrusted with carrying another’s life in your hands. My times are in thy hand: deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me. David said furthermore, As the LORD liveth, the LORD shall smite him; or his day shall come to die; or he shall descend into battle, and perish. At the age of 29 Rachel Clarke decided on a change of career, a starting out in journalism in television news she decided the pull of a career in medicine was too great. After all, both her father and grandfather both had careers in medicine. So now it time for Rachel to follow in their footsteps. In Your Life in My Hands Rachel Clarke talks passionately about life as a junior doctor in the NHS.

Who would I recommend this book to?

While the political aspects of the junior doctor dispute are riveting and enlightening, the parts of the book that left the deepest impression on me are those in which Clarke recounts the human experiences that have continuously reinforced her faith in medicine and its healing power. The declining health of our loved ones is a predicament that none of us want to face. Knowing that there will always be a system in place to take care of them is a comforting assurance. Therefore, continuing to uphold the values of the NHS while not subjecting its workers to further stress will provide the crucial anchorage for a better future. Who would I recommend this book to?

In this heartfelt, deeply personal account of life as a junior doctor in today’s health service, former television journalist turned doctor, Rachel Clarke, captures the extraordinary realities of ordinary life on the NHS front line. From the historic junior doctor strikes of 2016 to the ‘humanitarian crisis’ declared by the Red Cross, the overstretched health service is on the precipice, calling for junior doctors to draw on extraordinary reserves of what compelled them into medicine in the first place - and the value the NHS can least afford to lose - kindness. Unsurprisingly, this book made its way into my life through the Oxford Medicine Introductory Reading List. Another medicine-related read, it will be enlightening for all aspiring medics and medical students, especially those who are living or studying in the UK. For myself, this has served as an invaluable introduction to the health system which I am about to enter but have never experienced first-hand. Albeit from a slightly condemning perspective, the candid reflections are deeply moving. a decade after we faced the abyss, the compassion and humanity of one NICU nurse remain indelibly etched in my memory.And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom.

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(15) My times are in thy hand-- i.e., the vicissitudes of human life (LXX. and Vulg. have "my destinies") are under Divine control, so that the machinations of the foe cannot prevail against one whom God intends to deliver. For the expression comp. 1Chronicles 29:30, "the times that went over him," Isaiah 33:6. To be a medical novice who makes decisions which - if you get them wrong - might forever alter, or end, a person’s life? I am a junior doctor. It is 4 a.m. I have run arrest calls, treated life-threatening bleeding, held the hand of a young woman dying of cancer, scuttled down miles of dim corridors wanting to sob with sheer exhaustion, forgotten to eat, forgotten to drink, drawn on every fibre of strength that I possess to keep my patients safe from harm.’ I would still recommend it's read by prospective UK doctors (it's very UK centric) rather than someone in the US or European systems. Since his days are determined and the number of his months is with You, and since You have set limits that he cannot exceed,These are the extraordinary realities of the NHS front line. From the historic junior doctor strikes to the 'humanitarian crisis' declared by the Red Cross, the overstretched health service is on the precipice.