"'Li was accused of experimenting on people,' Freireich said. But in the 1970s, during the height of aggressive combination chemotherapy trials, Mukherjee paints a different picture of doctor-patient interaction: "The language of suffering had parted, with the 'smiling oncologist' on one side and his patients on the other." How have the relationships between doctors and patients evolved along with cancer treatments? What could be done to restore some of the lapses in this relationship?Ħ. "The stories of my patients consumed me, and the decisions that I made haunted me," Mukherjee says about working in a cancer clinic (page 5).
How so? Why do Farber's trials mark a turning point in the history of cancer research?ĥ.
But with the results of these trials, Mukherjee writes, Farber "saw a door open-briefly, seductively" (page 36). Looked at one way, Sidney Farber's early clinical trials with antifolates in 19 were a failure, with all of his young leukemia patients eventually dying of the disease. Is there any difference in the way you discuss cancer as a political or news topic and how you discuss a cancer diagnosis among family and friends?Ĥ. Compare this to how we view cancer today. Mukherjee writes how in the early 1950s The New York Times refused to print the word "cancer" (or "breast"). What did you find interesting or important about Carla's experience? How do you think she shaped the author's life and thoughts?ģ. Mukherjee frames the book around the story of his patient, Carla Reed, a teacher who is diagnosed with leukemia. In what sense, then, is cancer a disease of modern times? How does knowing its ancient history affect your notion of cancer?Ģ. Cancer is often described as a "modern" disease-yet its first description dates from 2500 B.C.
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