Doctor of the Heart: An Autobiography Book

I have spent a good part of the last 30 years covering the author of this book for my newspaper, and I have to say that this autobiography captures him very well. On the one hand, it shows his remarkable persistence, courage and intelligence in pursuing the dream of organ transplantation, especially in the days when death rates were high and much of the medical establishment stood against him.

It also reveals his big heart, especially for the children whose lives he sought to save. Many have said that Tom Starzl was never happier than when he attended the reunions of children who had received transplants. In the course of his obsessive dedication, however, he also saw his first marriage crumble, and his relationships with his own children were hurt as well.

Starzl the doctor writes well, except for those moments in his life when he wants to be vague, either to protect himself and others, and then his prose becomes more than a little opaque. The failure of his first marriage, the attacks his program suffered when a Pittsburgh newspaper wrote a Pulitzer-winning series about favoritism shown to Middle Eastern kidney patients, and other touchy episodes are mentioned briefly or not at all.

But when he wants to explain the importance of the liver to human health and the vital need for transplants for those who have no other option, he is clear, compelling and does not ever lapse into jargon. And he shows clearly why research was always as important to him as surgical mastery. In fact, he reveals, he never liked doing surgery, and was always afraid of failing his patients.

The book is also filled with many poignant moments. Two that stick in my mind are Dr. Starzl visiting his ailing father, who had suffered two strokes and was paralyzed from the neck down, and being mystified by the background noise. A nurse told him that his father, who had long run the town's newspaper, had asked that the everyday noises of the newsroom be piped into his room to give him comfort. Another was after a very long operation, when one doctor on Starzl's team had to manually pump pint after pint of blood into the patient over a 20-hour period, and collapsed sobbing at the end of the successful operation, both from pain and sheer relief.

The Puzzle People is well worth reading if you want to understand the uphill swim that organ transplantation went through in the 1960s and 1970s, and for its sharply etched portraits of some of the pioneers in the field.