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A Fortunate Woman’ sets out in compelling detail the relationship-based care that will be lost forever if we do not act to support and revitalize a profession under threat. It is a vibrant and authentic portrait of the rural family doctor in these difficult contemporary times. Trisha Greenhalgh, Professor of Primary Care, University of Oxford Morland writes about nature and the changing landscape with such lyrical precision that her prose sometimes seems close to poetry' - Christina Patterson, The Sunday Times Next is a man who has recently suffered a debilitating stroke, but in a perfunctory external assessment has been declared fit for work, and so will lose his right to universal credit against the advice of the doctor and specialist. He’s not sure where to turn. Another letter is written, and while he is there, the doctor also treats him for dermatitis.
A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland, Richard Baker - Waterstones A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland, Richard Baker - Waterstones
This book was inspired by the discovery of a long-lost book in the bookcase of the author’s mother—John Berger’s A Fortunate Man—which was itself the story of a country doctor published in the 1960s. In a series of coincidences, unbeknown to her, author Polly Morland found that she was living in the same remote valley that was the setting for A Fortunate Man. In turn she spoke to the current doctor of the valley who said that Berger’s book had been a big influence on her own choices to become a doctor. Author and doctor began to meet and talk, and the idea for a parallel book, set in modern times, came about. In this rare rural setting the doctor knows her patients well and provides a system of continual care in their community.Even before the pandemic, doctor-patient relationships were in serious trouble. A mobile population, a shortage of doctors, overwhelming workloads, the move towards part-time working (for many GPs, the only way to endure the pressures of the job), bigger practices, larger teams: all of this gnawed away at the humanity of primary care. Meanwhile, the rise of evidence-based medicine has seen a shift towards the management of health risk via a playbook of standardised interventions. While this has driven progress in the treatment of many illnesses, it’s had unintended consequences for the relationship between GPs and their patients. Precisely because the value of those relationships is difficult to render in cold, hard figures, performance metrics are skewed towards outcomes that are easier to quantify. The emphasis, and indeed the measure of success, has shifted from the individual patient to the disease. This will have an impact on all of us at some point. But without more widespread recognition of the problem, we might not even notice what we are missing out on. A longitudinal study of continuity of primary care in England published in 2021 showed that not only were fewer patients able to see their preferred GP, but fewer even had a preferred GP in the first place. We have, it seems, forgotten to expect, or even to want, a doctor who knows our stories. That experience of a doctor-patient relationship that’s more than transactional is slipping from collective memory. And if it’s something you have never known, why on earth would you cherish it, or fight for it? The descriptions of both the people and the place are a delight, beautifully illustrated by Richard Baker’s photographs. Although there is loss and grief in this book, it is also a celebration of what general practice can be at its best. Recommended reading for all aspiring doctors, and especially for those working in health policy, so they may understand and preserve the crown jewels of the NHS. Dr Helen Salisbury, Nuffield Department of Primary Care, University of Oxford The doctor’s compassion and hard work is a constant reminder of her and her family’s dedication to her vocation. It was not that she was out of the ordinary’writes Polly Morland near the start of her compelling and beautifully written book A Fortunate Woman, ‘ Put simply, she is a doctor who knows her patients. She is the keeper of their stories, over years and across generations, witness to the infinite variety of their lives. These stories, she says, are what her job is all about. They are what sustain her, even in days as hard as these.’
A Fortunate Woman review: John Berger’s classic upated - New
Listening has become even more crucial. Ten-minute appointments are bad enough. Covid meant doing that behind a mask and face-visor, in scrubs made of old duvet covers. Now there is the telephone consultation. In the before-times, the doctor made a point of accompanying a patient from waiting room to consulting room, because it gave her a chance to assess their mobility and demeanour. Now there is the phone. The doctor has become adept at reading a voice, its hesitancies, emotions, evasions; 16 calls in a morning is the norm. Morland writes about nature and the changing landscape with such lyrical precision that her prose sometimes seems close to poetry . . . There has been no shortage in recent years of books about healthcare . . . With this gem, Morland has done something similar for general practice. Let’s just hope the policymakers listen. If you want to read a book that moves you both at the level of sentence and the quality of language and with the emotional depth of its subject matter, then A Fortunate Woman is definitely the book you should be reading’ - Samanth Subramanian, Baillie Gifford judge If all that sounds despairing, Hodges then opens his doors, as he does every working morning, to offer the everyday hope of consultation. Aspen has moved to 15-minute appointments (from the NHS regular 10), because it accepts “that most people will come with a list and it makes sense to look at everything”. I sit quietly in the corner and, with consent, observe that still sacred confessional between GP and patient. Looking on, it is hard not to see almost every case as a brief essay on the state of the nation. Beautifully written, beguiling, important, overlaid with kindness, quietly woven with a sense of place and a profound insight into how rural communities function. I loved this book. Robert Penn, author of Slow Rise& The Man Who Made Things Out of TreesA remarkable, gripping and inspiring book that itself must surely become recommended reading for today’s trainee GPs… a gust of fresh, clear, contemporary air. Reading the Forest All human life is here in this evocative portrayal of the challenges and joys of rural family doctoring in modern times. Enthralling and uplifting. James Le Fanu, author of The Rise & Fall of Modern Medicine
A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland - Pan Macmillan
Contains a profound message for the future at a critical moment for general practice and us all' - Wendy Moore, TLS An immersive study… Morland’s book contains a profound message for the future at a critical moment for general practice and us all. Times Literary Supplement Polly Morland and Richard Baker have more than done justice to the original John Berger book – and produced a work that stimulates the eye and the mind in equal measure. Alain de Botton This is no rural Call the Midwife, but a superb look at one woman making a difference… Morland writes about nature and the changing landscape with such lyrical precision that her prose sometimes seems close to poetry. There has been no shortage in recent years of books about healthcare . . . With this gem, Morland has done something similar for general practice. The Sunday Times This biography is as much about person and place as it is about the transformation of family medicine from the human connections of a country doctor to a monolithic public service focused on efficiencies, fiscal accountability, and key performance indicators. It's a story that mirrors a similar transformation of society at large. As a member of the community she serves, the Fortunate Doctor knows her patients as more than just reporting data, but as human beings, and all the complexities and baggage that that involves—as did the doctor who served in this place before her.This is a contemporary look at a rural practitioner, who serves the same Gloucestershire community as the Fortunate Man of Berger's classic, but so much more emotive and visceral. She, as her predecessor (bar one), embeds herself in the community she serves and shows rather than tells the huge benefits for both patient and clinician of this cross-pollination for their health.
A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland | Book review | The TLS A Fortunate Woman by Polly Morland | Book review | The TLS
This was exactly my cup of tea. A beautifully written portrait of a rural GP whose tender care for her patients elicits such trust, admiration and even friendship that it seems almost alien in our transactional medical system. Morland writes about nature and the changing landscape with such lyrical precision that her prose sometimes seems close to poetry’ - Christina Patterson, The Sunday Times
Beautiful and fascinating … it combines the structural elements of storytelling with the skill of real-life reporting, clustering them in the brilliance of a cloisonné-finish. Dundee University Review of the Arts
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