Dancing at the River's Edge: A Patient and Her Doctor Negotiate Life with Chronic Illness

An invaluable resource for medical professionals, victims of chronic illnesses, and their loved ones, this dual memoir by a doctor and his longtime patient traces the growth of their unique friendship over a span of decades. By exploring the bond between caregiver and sufferer, this sensitive account evokes not only the constant day to day frustrations and emotional toll suffered by the chronically ill, but also an understanding of the mental struggles and conflicts that a conscientious doctor must face in deciding how best to treat a patient without compromising personal freedoms. In alternating chapters, the narrative explores the frustration, joy, despair, grief, and pain on both sides of the doctor-patient relationship.

Alida Brill is a sociologist, an essayist, and the author of several nonfiction books, including Dimensions of Tolerance, Nobody’s Business, and A Rising Public Voice. She lives in New York City. Michael D. Lockshin, MD, is one of America's preeminent experts in the long-term care of chronically ill patients. He is the director of the Barbara Volcker Center for Women and Rheumatic Disease at the Hospital for Special Surgery and a professor of medicine and obstetrics-gynecology at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University in New York. He is the author of Guarded Prognosis and The Hospital for Special Surgery Rheumatoid Arthritis Handbook. He lives in New York City.