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Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic: A Nurse Practitioner Remembers
Running a clinic for seniors requires a lot more than simply providing medical care. In Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic, Marianna Crane chases out scam artists and abusive adult children, plans a funeral, signs her own name to social security checks, and butts heads with her staff―two spirited older women who are more well-intentioned than professional―even as she deals with a difficult situation at home, where the tempestuous relationship with her own mother is deteriorating further than ever before. Eventually, however, Crane maneuvers her mother out of her household and into an apartment of her own―but only after a power struggle and no small amount of guilt―and she finally begins to learn from her older staff and her patients how to juggle traditional health care with unconventional actions to meet the complex needs of a frail and underserved elderly population.
232 pages, Paperback
Published November 6, 2018
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245 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
July 3, 2019
The author, a pioneer in gerontological nursing, shares poignant stories from her time running a Senior Clinic for the underprivileged in Chicago. Shows the real deal of front line nursing while also telling her own story of dealing with a difficult aging mother. At turns heartbreaking, humorous and inspiring. Highly recommended!
Pub Date 06 Nov 2018.
Thanks to the author, She Writes Press, and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are mine.
#StoriesFromTheTenthFloorClinic #NetGalley
Pub Date 06 Nov 2018.
Thanks to the author, She Writes Press, and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are mine.
#StoriesFromTheTenthFloorClinic #NetGalley
October 30, 2018
Marianna Crane has written an important memoir detailing the complex needs of an aging population and how a humane society should shift its thinking about what is “conscious-care” when people reach a certain level of fragility. The reader journeys along with Marianna while her beliefs change as a nurse practitioner, running a senior clinic within a Chicago-based, subsidized-housing building.
As a nurse practitioner specializing in gerontology at the Veteran’s Administration, Marianna is governed by strict parameters. When a job change takes her to a senior clinic within a CHA building, she faces an environment quite different from where she trained and is forced to adapt so she can help those under her care. Many of her patients are alone, disconnected from family, and easy prey for those intent on stealing their meager incomes. Continuing to live independently can be difficult when a patient’s health moves swiftly downhill and there are no friends or relatives to assist in decision-making. Residents of the building have come to rely on the clinic and its support staff to ensure they have social interaction, food in the refrigerator, and a fan when the heat becomes dangerously high.
After work, Marianna’s home life is fraught with similar issues, as a complicated relationship with her mother has reached an unsustainable level of dysfunction. Her mother has become increasingly combative, and her disinclination to engage therapeutically requires Marianna to devise a solution that is respectful to her husband and two teenage children while ensuring her mother has a safe place to land. Utilizing the new approach that she’s been reluctantly taking with her patients affords Marianna necessary skills to handle this emotionally-challenging situation.
With chapters unfolding in story form, the reader glimpses the lives of vulnerable people. We learn what happens when the frail are shuttled into the corners of society without enough support. Filling that gap in care are Mattie and Mary, who work under the direction of Ms. Crane and are devoted to building humane over-sight relationships with the residents. Mattie and Mary compel Marianna to redefine her role in the clinic community by introducing her to Angelika, a woman choosing to die in her apartment instead of going to a hospital. Angelika has refused a diagnosis of the ailment ending her life. After losing the battle of Angelika’s resistance to leaving her home, Marianna allows herself to adjust to the needs of those she is intent on helping. She comes to understand that sometimes care means respecting the wishes of a dying woman and not requiring her to take a final breath in the hospital, even if doing so breaks a dozen rules in the process.
The stories Ms. Crane starkly and, at times, graphically illustrates occurred in the 1980’s. Similar events are continuing to unfold today in subsidized housing and homes all across the country. Difficulties the aging and poor experience in navigating ill-health and death within a system built for the well-off and healthy have worsened in the time since the author encountered these experiences. The VA, health clinics and senior care programs are still underfunded and mismanaged, exacerbating the condition of buildings and staffing needs.
There are no concrete solutions to the problems we face in determining how to care for a growing low-income, aging population. It is my fervent wish as a reader of this memoir that we do so with an ability to change our thinking, much as Marianna Crane convinced herself to do. Convenient, easily-enacted answers to the complex struggles of the elderly, many of whom are not connected to functional families, will not be successful. As Marianna came to her own epiphanies on how to be of assistance, so must our national community. This is a relational issue and it deserves a relationally-creative response, one that is centered on humane and caring treatment for all ill, infirm, and end-stage-aged people.
As a nurse practitioner specializing in gerontology at the Veteran’s Administration, Marianna is governed by strict parameters. When a job change takes her to a senior clinic within a CHA building, she faces an environment quite different from where she trained and is forced to adapt so she can help those under her care. Many of her patients are alone, disconnected from family, and easy prey for those intent on stealing their meager incomes. Continuing to live independently can be difficult when a patient’s health moves swiftly downhill and there are no friends or relatives to assist in decision-making. Residents of the building have come to rely on the clinic and its support staff to ensure they have social interaction, food in the refrigerator, and a fan when the heat becomes dangerously high.
After work, Marianna’s home life is fraught with similar issues, as a complicated relationship with her mother has reached an unsustainable level of dysfunction. Her mother has become increasingly combative, and her disinclination to engage therapeutically requires Marianna to devise a solution that is respectful to her husband and two teenage children while ensuring her mother has a safe place to land. Utilizing the new approach that she’s been reluctantly taking with her patients affords Marianna necessary skills to handle this emotionally-challenging situation.
With chapters unfolding in story form, the reader glimpses the lives of vulnerable people. We learn what happens when the frail are shuttled into the corners of society without enough support. Filling that gap in care are Mattie and Mary, who work under the direction of Ms. Crane and are devoted to building humane over-sight relationships with the residents. Mattie and Mary compel Marianna to redefine her role in the clinic community by introducing her to Angelika, a woman choosing to die in her apartment instead of going to a hospital. Angelika has refused a diagnosis of the ailment ending her life. After losing the battle of Angelika’s resistance to leaving her home, Marianna allows herself to adjust to the needs of those she is intent on helping. She comes to understand that sometimes care means respecting the wishes of a dying woman and not requiring her to take a final breath in the hospital, even if doing so breaks a dozen rules in the process.
The stories Ms. Crane starkly and, at times, graphically illustrates occurred in the 1980’s. Similar events are continuing to unfold today in subsidized housing and homes all across the country. Difficulties the aging and poor experience in navigating ill-health and death within a system built for the well-off and healthy have worsened in the time since the author encountered these experiences. The VA, health clinics and senior care programs are still underfunded and mismanaged, exacerbating the condition of buildings and staffing needs.
There are no concrete solutions to the problems we face in determining how to care for a growing low-income, aging population. It is my fervent wish as a reader of this memoir that we do so with an ability to change our thinking, much as Marianna Crane convinced herself to do. Convenient, easily-enacted answers to the complex struggles of the elderly, many of whom are not connected to functional families, will not be successful. As Marianna came to her own epiphanies on how to be of assistance, so must our national community. This is a relational issue and it deserves a relationally-creative response, one that is centered on humane and caring treatment for all ill, infirm, and end-stage-aged people.
November 6, 2018
The author provided insight into the many hats that those that work in the health care industry and treat older patients have to perform. While reading this, I was struck with empathy for this woman who goes out of her way to assist her patients in all aspects of their lives while those that should be doing the heavy work (children or other family members), watch from the sidelines. It is a growing epidemic in our Country and is going to get worse. I feel that we as a nation have stopped caring for our elderly and need to go back to the days of looking out for them more. I was heartbroken reading about some of the author's patients and thankful that they had her to care for them. This is a great book that raises awareness to a bigger issue, along with great stories of the author's time in healthcare.
November 10, 2018
Thank you to NetGalley, She Writes Press and Marianna Crane for an ARC ebook copy to review. As always, an honest review from me.
Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic is a wonderful representation of the realities of nursing. The author tells stories from her time running a clinic for seniors. She was one of the first gerontological nurse practitioners in the 1980s. A pioneer in the field!
I liked that the book shows the realities of nursing: the good, bad and mundane. The more accurate representations in the media, the better. Certainly no silly stereotypes here. The author told her experiences with authenticity, dignity and respect for her elderly clients.
While the realities of aging can be unpleasant at times, that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve kindness and human decency. A great addition to the literature and history about the nursing profession.
Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic is a wonderful representation of the realities of nursing. The author tells stories from her time running a clinic for seniors. She was one of the first gerontological nurse practitioners in the 1980s. A pioneer in the field!
I liked that the book shows the realities of nursing: the good, bad and mundane. The more accurate representations in the media, the better. Certainly no silly stereotypes here. The author told her experiences with authenticity, dignity and respect for her elderly clients.
While the realities of aging can be unpleasant at times, that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve kindness and human decency. A great addition to the literature and history about the nursing profession.
February 16, 2020
What a lovely, tender memoir Marianna Crane has written in STORIES FROM THE TENTH FLOOR CLINIC.
In the 1980’s Nurse Practitioner Marianna Crane is hired to manage a clinic on the tenth floor of a high-rise senior-living facility. What she finds is much more than a nursing job. These residents, often forgotten and generally marginalized, need so much more than medical care. With the help of able assistants, Marianna tends to her patients with so much love and compassion. And while dealing with her all-consuming job, she also must tend to a difficult family situation—a challenging relationship with her live-in, aging mother.
I was touched by Ms. Crane’s account and moved by the courage it must have taken to tell this raw story. A beautifully written, must-read memoir.
In the 1980’s Nurse Practitioner Marianna Crane is hired to manage a clinic on the tenth floor of a high-rise senior-living facility. What she finds is much more than a nursing job. These residents, often forgotten and generally marginalized, need so much more than medical care. With the help of able assistants, Marianna tends to her patients with so much love and compassion. And while dealing with her all-consuming job, she also must tend to a difficult family situation—a challenging relationship with her live-in, aging mother.
I was touched by Ms. Crane’s account and moved by the courage it must have taken to tell this raw story. A beautifully written, must-read memoir.
November 27, 2019
This is a memoir of a time during the 1980s when the nurse practitioner Marianna Crane ran a clinic for senior citizens in the poor part of Chicago. The clinic is inside a CHA (senior housing) building and she and the people who work with her do more for the residents of the building above and beyond of what is required of them.
This book may sound as if it is the account of what happened in a public housing building in Chicago, but it is much more than that because in its details lie the complexity of caring for the elderly and how difficult it is for the caregivers that do not get adequate backing from the officials. In that sense, this book brings our attention to the societal needs of the elderly and the shortcomings of the industry of medical care.
In the beginning of the memoirs, being a stickler for the rules that Marianna learned during her training, she is at first shocked at the humane but lackadaisical approach of the people (Mary and Mattie) who were working there before her since they knew well the elderly living in the building and their circumstances. They are very good in bending the rules when it comes to helping the old people and respecting their wishes.
Many of the residents of the building are living alone, most of them away from or disconnected to their families, and they become prey to crooks or their family members who fool them to get what little income their pensions or social security pays. As Marianna works there, she too learns that rules don't always work for the best and her relationships with her co-workers improve greatly.
Marianna also has a problem in her private life that parallels the difficulties she faces at work. Her mother who has come to live with her and her family is a complicated person who is antagonistic and aggressive toward Marianna. Since Marianna fears the decline =of her relationship with her husband and two teenage children, she begins to look for a suitable place for her mother to settle and live alone.
In this setup, Marianna’s memoirs introduce the reader not only to the residents and patients in the building but also the doorman and other staff’s problems and their relationships to the author and other characters. This is where her writing shines because each characterization is written with a keen insight and acute observation, added to the compassion, empathy, and service that both Marianna and her co-workers provide. Although some of the writing sounds like case studies, the fragility of the patients is also highlighted as well as their heartbreaking endings, as well as a few successes, along the way.
I was drawn to this book because of its writer. I am not a nurse but nurses are my favorite people since they are intent in helping and providing the best care for their patients under all circumstances. That is why I picked up this book and I am really glad I read it because I am familiar with how vulnerable the elderly can be and how desperately good care with understanding and respect for the individuality of the patients are needed under any and all circumstances. Marianna, certainly has brought these and other such points to light in her clear and straightforward narration that also emits a sense of humor, from time to time.
This book may sound as if it is the account of what happened in a public housing building in Chicago, but it is much more than that because in its details lie the complexity of caring for the elderly and how difficult it is for the caregivers that do not get adequate backing from the officials. In that sense, this book brings our attention to the societal needs of the elderly and the shortcomings of the industry of medical care.
In the beginning of the memoirs, being a stickler for the rules that Marianna learned during her training, she is at first shocked at the humane but lackadaisical approach of the people (Mary and Mattie) who were working there before her since they knew well the elderly living in the building and their circumstances. They are very good in bending the rules when it comes to helping the old people and respecting their wishes.
Many of the residents of the building are living alone, most of them away from or disconnected to their families, and they become prey to crooks or their family members who fool them to get what little income their pensions or social security pays. As Marianna works there, she too learns that rules don't always work for the best and her relationships with her co-workers improve greatly.
Marianna also has a problem in her private life that parallels the difficulties she faces at work. Her mother who has come to live with her and her family is a complicated person who is antagonistic and aggressive toward Marianna. Since Marianna fears the decline =of her relationship with her husband and two teenage children, she begins to look for a suitable place for her mother to settle and live alone.
In this setup, Marianna’s memoirs introduce the reader not only to the residents and patients in the building but also the doorman and other staff’s problems and their relationships to the author and other characters. This is where her writing shines because each characterization is written with a keen insight and acute observation, added to the compassion, empathy, and service that both Marianna and her co-workers provide. Although some of the writing sounds like case studies, the fragility of the patients is also highlighted as well as their heartbreaking endings, as well as a few successes, along the way.
I was drawn to this book because of its writer. I am not a nurse but nurses are my favorite people since they are intent in helping and providing the best care for their patients under all circumstances. That is why I picked up this book and I am really glad I read it because I am familiar with how vulnerable the elderly can be and how desperately good care with understanding and respect for the individuality of the patients are needed under any and all circumstances. Marianna, certainly has brought these and other such points to light in her clear and straightforward narration that also emits a sense of humor, from time to time.
October 22, 2018
Stories From the Tenth-Floor Clinic: A Nurse Practitioner Remembers by Marianna Crane is non-fiction collection of anecdotal stories from her time working as a Gerontological Nurse Practitioner in Chicago. I had the privilege of obtaining an advance readers copy from NetGalley, She Writes Press and Caitlin Hamilton Marketing before this book is published on November 6, 2018. Marianna was one of the first nurse practitioners in the 1980’s to specialize in gerontology and she was given the opportunity to run a Senior Clinic within a senior housing building, in a poorer part of Chicago. The stories track along, detailing various experiences with the residents of the building who become her patients. At first only wanting to tend to their medical needs, Marianna softens and is surprised the effect her patients have on her when she finds herself deeper into their social lives than she ever wanted to be.
The book is a case study on how nursing is so much more than caring for a patient’s medical needs. Nurses care for the whole patient including all of their medical, physical, mental, emotional and social needs. Being a nurse myself, I really enjoyed reading this book and getting to know glimpses of the patients she saw in the clinic. This was a quick and easy read and really reminded me that we have such an impact on our patients’ lives long after we stop caring for them. I would recommend this book to any nurse or human-being who enjoys reading about human relationships and the bonds we form with one another. Be sure to get a copy of Stories From the Tenth-Floor Clinic: A Nurse Practitioner Remembers once it’s released on November 6th!
The book is a case study on how nursing is so much more than caring for a patient’s medical needs. Nurses care for the whole patient including all of their medical, physical, mental, emotional and social needs. Being a nurse myself, I really enjoyed reading this book and getting to know glimpses of the patients she saw in the clinic. This was a quick and easy read and really reminded me that we have such an impact on our patients’ lives long after we stop caring for them. I would recommend this book to any nurse or human-being who enjoys reading about human relationships and the bonds we form with one another. Be sure to get a copy of Stories From the Tenth-Floor Clinic: A Nurse Practitioner Remembers once it’s released on November 6th!
November 2, 2018
As a family nurse practitioner, I read Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic with great interest. This book accurately represented everything I value about my profession--compassion, service, empathy, and making a positive difference in the lives of the underserved through advocacy.
When Marianne Crane takes charge of the senior clinic in a Chicago subsidized housing building, she faces all sorts of unforeseen challenges, such as planning funerals, chasing our scam artists, protecting her clients from abusive adult children, navigating around strong-willed staff. She steps out on a limb daily to help her clients, signing social security checks, often circumventing the system while providing traditional medical care to the best of her ability. Interwoven into this narrative is the underlying strained relationship she has with her elderly mother.
What comes through so clearly is her dedication to the welfare of her vulnerable clients and her commitment to providing them with the best possible care. Her writing is engaging, witty and descriptive and highlights both the plight of the frail elderly and the difference a nurse practitioner can make through compassionate listening and intervention.
An accurate and engaging portrayal of the role of the nurse practitioner in advocating for the frail elderly.
When Marianne Crane takes charge of the senior clinic in a Chicago subsidized housing building, she faces all sorts of unforeseen challenges, such as planning funerals, chasing our scam artists, protecting her clients from abusive adult children, navigating around strong-willed staff. She steps out on a limb daily to help her clients, signing social security checks, often circumventing the system while providing traditional medical care to the best of her ability. Interwoven into this narrative is the underlying strained relationship she has with her elderly mother.
What comes through so clearly is her dedication to the welfare of her vulnerable clients and her commitment to providing them with the best possible care. Her writing is engaging, witty and descriptive and highlights both the plight of the frail elderly and the difference a nurse practitioner can make through compassionate listening and intervention.
An accurate and engaging portrayal of the role of the nurse practitioner in advocating for the frail elderly.
November 23, 2018
Wonderful and thoughtul book on caring for the elderly. What the author has provided is immeasureable. Wonderful testament to her caring ways and committment to help others. Many blessings to the author. Thanks to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for the ARC of this book. Although I received the book in this manner, it did not affect my opinion of this book nor my review.
February 23, 2020
If one wishes to explore a new world, let author Marianna Crane take you there. Hers is not a galaxy; not a fantasy; not the whereabouts of witches and warlocks. In Chicago exists a universe far, far away from your reality.
The reader will be mystified, awed, and startled to discover an assortment of genuine human beings in sub-standard housing clinging to life, unseen but in full view of the broadest shoulders in the American Midwest.
It is not a telescopic lens that reveals this place, but a telepathic pen wielded by this former geriatric nurse who practiced her craft by operating a meager clinic sporting a motley staff of imperfect but motivated caregivers. Ms. Crane is akin to the school nurse, whose patients of a "certain age" exhibit patterns of potential dilemmas and little wherewithal to deal with them.
This book contains excellent descriptions of people and place. It takes you up the last-legs elevator, past the soot-coated windows, and through the often-unlocked doors of apartments where the only certainty is unpredictability. You meet the helpless and the hapless. Many are forgotten, most are forgetful. Some are cured, others curiosities. Maladies and mischief are threats. They may no longer care to live; even the dead need someone who cares.
The author takes you inside this world and also lets you inside her mind as events unfold and her approach evolves. Decisions were made by feel in an age when there were few bookish practices for geriatric medicine. There are sufficient personal details to understand the writer's own life challenges while dealing with her patients.
Clear, concise, and informative, the Tenth-Floor Clinic pages are a place of discovery. One might think of finding medical processes there, but the ultimate reveals are the common people and the surprise at how unknown the elderly community is to most of us. Ill-equipped to render care in the manner of Nurse Crane, it is beyond my reach to grasp how such professionals persevere. These sublime stories help one appreciate their work evermore. Bless them all.
Read "Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic" to find a world you likely have never seen that is more important than domains created in fiction and more real than any reality show.
The reader will be mystified, awed, and startled to discover an assortment of genuine human beings in sub-standard housing clinging to life, unseen but in full view of the broadest shoulders in the American Midwest.
It is not a telescopic lens that reveals this place, but a telepathic pen wielded by this former geriatric nurse who practiced her craft by operating a meager clinic sporting a motley staff of imperfect but motivated caregivers. Ms. Crane is akin to the school nurse, whose patients of a "certain age" exhibit patterns of potential dilemmas and little wherewithal to deal with them.
This book contains excellent descriptions of people and place. It takes you up the last-legs elevator, past the soot-coated windows, and through the often-unlocked doors of apartments where the only certainty is unpredictability. You meet the helpless and the hapless. Many are forgotten, most are forgetful. Some are cured, others curiosities. Maladies and mischief are threats. They may no longer care to live; even the dead need someone who cares.
The author takes you inside this world and also lets you inside her mind as events unfold and her approach evolves. Decisions were made by feel in an age when there were few bookish practices for geriatric medicine. There are sufficient personal details to understand the writer's own life challenges while dealing with her patients.
Clear, concise, and informative, the Tenth-Floor Clinic pages are a place of discovery. One might think of finding medical processes there, but the ultimate reveals are the common people and the surprise at how unknown the elderly community is to most of us. Ill-equipped to render care in the manner of Nurse Crane, it is beyond my reach to grasp how such professionals persevere. These sublime stories help one appreciate their work evermore. Bless them all.
Read "Stories from the Tenth-Floor Clinic" to find a world you likely have never seen that is more important than domains created in fiction and more real than any reality show.
May 19, 2020
I loved this book- maybe it’s my nursing background but I don’t think so. Marianna Crane told the stories of the Senior Clinic with easy to understand language and empathy. I truly enjoyed reading about her work and life. I hope she writes more books soon. It seems to me we need more senior clinics to help the elderly who frequently live alone. This book would appeal to anyone who is interested in nursing and gerontology.
May 8, 2020
I had trouble building interest in the book. I found Ms Canes dithering about her job and the opinionated mother that lived with her and her family tiring. However as I progressed the stories of the elderly people who lived and died in the apartment complex associated with the clinic became more captivating.
February 14, 2021
Very interesting stories of a gerontological nurse practitioner as she struggles to accept the challenges, heartaches, and joys of working with old adults in a low-income hi-rise apartment. Really fascinating, and sad, to read how so many people struggle with the everyday at the end of their lives, and how good nursing and social work can help - at least some of the time.
January 28, 2024
The language in this book is so insensitive to the patients described and there is such a lack of empathy in all of the patient interactions, that reading it just made me sad. I kept waiting for some kind of mental breakthrough to occur but I truly don’t know what the point of compiling these stories was.
April 24, 2020
2.5⭐️. An easily readable memoir from an OG NP that ran a gerontology OP clinic in a senior housing building in Chicago. I think by trying to keep it real she came across as a little cold/calloused but don’t think it was international.
June 5, 2020
Terrible book
I am a GPN and was appalled with this book. Ms Crane’s descriptions of the elderly clients under her care were demeaning and depressing. I am not sure why she wrote this book and am sorry I paid money for it
I am a GPN and was appalled with this book. Ms Crane’s descriptions of the elderly clients under her care were demeaning and depressing. I am not sure why she wrote this book and am sorry I paid money for it
May 8, 2021
Interesting and very readable. Lots of patient stories which is what I like.
July 2, 2020
This memoir, written by Marianna Crane, tells the tale of how she came to be a nurse practitioner on the tenth floor of a Chicago Housing building for elderly people. She keeps most of the stories light, but she works with, and ministers to, quite a few characters. I really enjoyed it.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews