Book excerpt: VIEW FROM THE BED: VIEW FROM THE BEDSIDE A Wising Up Anthology Editors: Heather Tosteson, Ph.D., Phyllis A. Langton, R.N., Ph.D., Charles D. Brockett, Ph.D. Who is the doctor or nurse who for better, or worse, you can't forget? The patient who changed your life? Thirty-eight contemporary writers explore with memoir, story, and poetry the different ways we talk about, to-and through-each other at the doctor's office, hospital, or sickbed. One surgeon celebrates his first surgical success; another grieves the death of a patient. A nurse finds her compassion exhausted by a suicidal patient; another keeps an unsentimental inventory of those moments that make it all worthwhile. Patients transitioning from a state mental hospital collaborate with clinicians to write an essay about their experiences. A mother poignantly reviews her son's twenty-five years with congenital heart disease. A woman with Crohn's disease ponders the nature of her twenty-year relationship with her physician; another masters the Zen of medical appointments in a fractured system. Nurses find themselves patients; patients grow into therapists. This book should appeal to anyone familiar with the view from the bed or the view from the bedside-and with our need individually and as a society for a comprehensive view that compassionately holds them both. CONTRIBUTORS: Patricia Barone, Rachel Squires Bloom, Ann J. Brady, Nancy J. Brandwein, Mary Ann DiMola, Nina Gaby, Jane Herschlag, Paul Hostovsky, Kathleen M. Kelley, Patricia Kett, Robert J. Kus, Mariette Landry, Phyllis A. Langton, Sara Lippmann, Zoe Losada, Gerri Luce, Frederika R. Maister, John Manesis, Michele Markarian, Carolyn McAuliffe, Elaine Morgan, Molly O'Dell, David W. Page, Diane Payne, Joel Peckham, Joan Phillips, Terry Sanville, Paula Sergi, Evelyn Sharenov, Claudette Mort Sigg, Matthew B. Smith, Robert P. Sticca, Maxine Susman, Sylvie Terespolski, Timothy Francis Urban, Claudia Van Gerven, Anne Webster, Gary Young