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Rating: 
Summary: This is a terrific book
Review:
Burn Unit is a marvelous book. The writing sparkles -- Ravage involves the reader in the progress of the patients she tracks, the history of burn care and medical understanding of burns, and the unique world of care givers in the field of burn treatment. Burns are not like other illnesses/injuries. This book brings the reader into unfamiliar territory (some of it difficult)-- but you can't put it down. Anyone with an interest in reading about medicine -- or about survival -- or about caring, will love this book.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating - impossible to put down!
Review: Being neither a medical professional nor a burn survivor, I didn't expect to be completely fascinated by this book, but I was - once I started reading it, I really couldn't put it down until I'd finished it. Ms. Ravage's skill in weaving together vivid details of life in the burn unit with overviews of burn science reminded me of one of my favorite writers, John McPhee. Like McPhee, she's able to take a subject the reader knows little about and within a few pages make that subject completely riveting. She also has McPhee's rare ability to illuminate her subject from every possible angle: this book covers the history of burn treatments, stories of some of the most deadly U.S. fires, how the human body responds to burns, the heroic daily work of burn doctors and nurses - and, most unforgettably, the hell endured by recovering burn patients. I was especially impressed by how perfect Ms. Ravage's tone was throughout the book: the scientific passages are easily understandable but not dumbed-down, and the descriptions of the emotionally-charged interactions among the burn unit staff , the patients, and their families are unforgettably moving without a hint of sentimentality. Despite the grimness of the subject, this book leaves you feeling wonderfully inspired by what ordinary people are capable of: unbelievable courage, endurance, devotion, and compassion.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating - impossible to put down!
Review: Being neither a medical professional nor a burn survivor, I didn't expect to be completely fascinated by this book, but I was - once I started reading it, I really couldn't put it down until I'd finished it. Ms. Ravage's skill in weaving together vivid details of life in the burn unit with overviews of burn science reminded me of one of my favorite writers, John McPhee. Like McPhee, she's able to take a subject the reader knows little about and within a few pages make that subject completely riveting. She also has McPhee's rare ability to illuminate her subject from every possible angle: this book covers the history of burn treatments, stories of some of the most deadly U.S. fires, how the human body responds to burns, the heroic daily work of burn doctors and nurses - and, most unforgettably, the hell endured by recovering burn patients. I was especially impressed by how perfect Ms. Ravage's tone was throughout the book: the scientific passages are easily understandable but not dumbed-down, and the descriptions of the emotionally-charged interactions among the burn unit staff , the patients, and their families are unforgettably moving without a hint of sentimentality. Despite the grimness of the subject, this book leaves you feeling wonderfully inspired by what ordinary people are capable of: unbelievable courage, endurance, devotion, and compassion.
Rating:
Summary: Unrapping the mystery of burn care
Review: I have just today finished Burn Unit. Finishing a book for me is relatively unusual. I always have a few going at a time, and most get only part way - they just don't get picked up again. But I keep returning to this book. Barbara Ravage has written a classic. Her writing is engaging, as she monitors burn survivors Dan and Tom and their families, without giving in to simplification and caricature. These people feel real. Their caregivers are presented in the context of their work. They convey the story of the technology and the medicine of burn care, in a remarkably lucid, interesting way. Their personal lives are, appropriately, only sketched. I had experience in the MGH Burn Unit as a fourth-year med student, in 1973. And I've had 26 years of primary care internal medicine in a rural area. This book has tought me a world of new perspectives and insights, basic science and intensive care medicine, and especially understandings about wound healing. And I believe the author has communicated this difficult material in a manner which will be comprehensible to any serious reader, even one without great technical background. Her ability to appeal to, and to be important to, a diverse reader base, reflects the maturity of her perspective. I have been recommending this book to friends and profiessional colleagues, as a most-worthwhile read. Any care provider will gain valuable understandings from this pleasant task.
Rating:
Summary: Unrapping the mystery of burn care
Review: I have just today finished Burn Unit. Finishing a book for me is relatively unusual. I always have a few going at a time, and most get only part way - they just don't get picked up again. But I keep returning to this book. Barbara Ravage has written a classic. Her writing is engaging, as she monitors burn survivors Dan and Tom and their families, without giving in to simplification and caricature. These people feel real. Their caregivers are presented in the context of their work. They convey the story of the technology and the medicine of burn care, in a remarkably lucid, interesting way. Their personal lives are, appropriately, only sketched. I had experience in the MGH Burn Unit as a fourth-year med student, in 1973. And I've had 26 years of primary care internal medicine in a rural area. This book has tought me a world of new perspectives and insights, basic science and intensive care medicine, and especially understandings about wound healing. And I believe the author has communicated this difficult material in a manner which will be comprehensible to any serious reader, even one without great technical background. Her ability to appeal to, and to be important to, a diverse reader base, reflects the maturity of her perspective. I have been recommending this book to friends and profiessional colleagues, as a most-worthwhile read. Any care provider will gain valuable understandings from this pleasant task.
Rating: 
Summary: Burn Unit
Review: In her riveting, intensely researched book, Burn Unit, Barbara Ravage draws the reader into the painful and perilous world in which the seriously burned exist. One qualifies for this world in a flash and once there, life can never be as it was. We follow two families to Mass General's superior Burn Unit, learning in fascinating detail what a separate world it is. Everything in this book is so finely drawn, from the family members suddenly faced with their own conflicting emotions, to the exquisitely-trained hospital personnel, to the description of the burns themselves. Ravage has written a compelling book about a little-understood subject. It's a book one cannot easily turn away from.
Rating:
Summary: Accurate, Insightful, Informative and well researched.
Review: Ms. Ravage's book focuses on the Burn Unit at Mass General Hospital, but in the course of providing the context for the current Burn Unit she weaves together several narratives. First, she offers an informative and well-written account of the history of burns and burn treatment from ancient times to modern. Additionally she describes the course of the severe burn injury, the series of shocks severe burns provide to the system and the medical interventions that have been developed in order to allow the burn patient to survive these shocks. Tied to her medical-scientific discussion are profiles of the people who make the Burn Unit work, and accounts of two patients who were treated by them. These case studies are based in large part on interviews with the patients and their families.
As a Burn Survivor who spent two months in the MGH Burn Unit not long after this book came out, I can vouch for its accuracy in depicting the unit, the staff, the course of treatment and many of the key issues facing burn survivors. Not everything I have read on the topic has held my interest, but this book did.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating, informative
Review: This is a powerful book, packed with information about the history of burn treatment, the structure and nature of skin, medical techniques, how the body heals and what it takes to work in the demanding field of burn care. The personal stories of the physicians, nurses, inventors, patients and their families sparkle with life. At times, I must admit, I became impatient with the structure of the book, the deep dives into details about historic fires or what felt like more information than I wanted to know about a particular medical technique. I longed to get back to what was happening with the people who came to feel like my patients, my staff. The wonderful thing is that Barbara Ravage can make you feel so intimately connected to the people she interviewed, the scenes she witnessed. You sense her driving curiosity and fascination. She makes descriptions of complicated information such as the body's responses to burns or difficult medical procedures vivid and clear. Sometimes her analogies will even make you smile. I plan to recommend this book to several friends.
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