DISCONTINUED: Council of Science Editors Book Club discussion

Welcome! Did everyone enjoy the book?

There are a lot of great topics we will discuss, but I'd like to start out with an easy one. What stood out to you the most after reading this book? Was there any information that shocked or surprised you?

What shocked me the most personally was the original motivation for Chemotherapy. I cannot imagine going though treatment, only to have doctors tell me the goal isn't to save my life, but to figure out how to save others. That part gave me chills!

I can't wait to hear everyone's thoughts!

I am not sure if I was shocked by much, but there were so many things that stood out for me. One of them is how messy science is. There is an orderliness to the scientific method, of course, but discovery is part design, part serendipity, and part luck. How the original chemotherapy drugs were conceived was also just so fascinating. It also exemplifies how theory can get in the way of itself in science, how adherence to a particular perspective can blind us to other possibilities (there is a bit of justification for a Kuhnian approach to the sociology of science).

Another fascinating read was the part of the Lasker era and how they marshalled science and the techniques of marketing and lobbying to press an agenda.

I have not quite finished the book (almost done), but I also am left with a much deeper appreciation of the complexity of cancer and its ultimate cure. The way the author approached the book, as a story with sometimes disparate threads, is brilliant.

Gary Burkholder

Kind of silly, but the thing that shocked me the most was realizing that Roswell Park Cancer Institute was not named after a place but was instead named after a surgeon named Dr. Roswell Park.

Beyond that, it always amazes me to hear the stories about how skeptical doctors were of the idea that smoking cigarettes could possibly cause cancer, continuing to smoke even while researching the potential link. And sad that many them succumbed to lung cancer themselves.

It was difficult for me to read about the hubris of the surgeons during the era of more and more radical mastectomies. The suffering and disfigurement these female patients endured at the hands of egomaniacs like Halsted in a zealous and futile attempt at a cure is upsetting.

Carissa - I also found the section about breast cancer upsetting and shocking. I do think I can see where the doctors were coming from - concluding that they must not have removed all of the cancer and needing to remove more. Learning that a lot of those patients lost the use of their arms, is very hard to comprehend.

Thankful that mastectomies have come a long way since that point!

Gary, I do also find myself to have a much deeper appreciation of the complexity of cancer after reading this book. It's opened my eyes to the cancer eras that we don't hear much about, today.

It was fascinating learning how they got the word out about childhood leukemia on the radio show - I was almost in tears during that section. Imagining how excited that boy was to meet his athlete idols was one of the highlights of the book in my opinion!

It's wonderful to see those same types of dreams coming true with the Make A Wish Foundation, today!

It took me a long time to finish this book, and parts of it were especially tough. I actually had a bit of a medical scare while reading it (everything turned out fine), which made it even more impactful. There is a certain arrogance to a lot of the people involved in scientific endeavors, and that came through loud and clear in the assumptions individual researchers made at various times that they were on the cusp of a complete cure (without even understanding the underlying biology!).

The sheer brutality of (most) surgery is amazing (not to mention the poisons used for chemotherapy), but the resilience of the human body is incredible and inspiring. As was the dedication and focus of a number of the doctors and researchers highlighted---though the focus of some, like Halsted, were the opposite.

I learned a lot about cell biology and genetics (as a genetics professor my dad would have been proud), and especially liked the more human elements: the story of Einer/Jimmy, Carla, etc. I liked that same element in the Henrietta Lacks book too.

Mike Friedman

Mike, I liked the human elements too and was actually hoping for more of that. When I started it, I was expecting he would weave in even more elements of his own patient encounters throughout the book.

Carissa wrote: "Mike, I liked the human elements too and was actually hoping for more of that. When I started it, I was expecting he would weave in even more elements of his own patient encounters throughout the b..."

Yeah, I agree he could have done more with that. I do remember stopping a time or two to say to myself that he was a very good writer.

I agree Mike - the writing is excellent. It really is written like an excellent personal biography and the development of all of the people who impacted the life of the central character. But it also had a lot of the suspense and intrigue of a good detective journalism piece. I was really captivated by the descriptions of the different players and how their personalities played such an important role.

I thought this interview with Sid Mukherjee might be of interest: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/8...

This is a wonderful interview, thank you for sharing. :)

This is the first book I've ever borrowed from the library that required four due date renewals to finish it! I often had to reread passages to try to grasp the complex concepts the author had translated into lay-language. Researchers work hard to avoid anthropomorphism so I found it a fun twist when Siddhartha Mukherjee approached cancer as a living entity. This frame of reference as the main character in a story, rather than the subject of a study, helped me internalize some of his points more readily than trying to analyze the material presented. I’m thinking about buying a copy of the book to keep in my office. I manage pharmacology publications so Mukherjee’s passages explaining cancer biology helped me understand some of the nuances in research among the peer-reviewers on our submissions. It was a lot of effort to get through the text but I felt like it was worth my time.

Thank you for suggesting and moderating this book as part of the CSE Book Club. While I don't know that "enjoy" is the appropriate description, a handful of things I learned from this book have permanently changed my perceptions of cancer and the diverse treatments available.

I find myself wondering if people have started asking their doctor how many mutations their specific cancer cells contain.

While I had heard of the radical mastectomy, the book served as a chilling reminder that even the best of intentions can be taken too far.

I can fully understand wanting an experimental treatment to be available to everyone, but also know that clinical research is important for long-term results.

All of these thoughts remind me information is one of our strongest tools.