This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor Paperback – 19 April 2018

I bought this after watching the series and really enjoyed it.It has a lot more stories than the series shows and they are filled with humour and at times, sorrow.It's a real invite into the lives and work of doctors.Great read.

Anyone who uses the NHS marvels at the incredible work of the nurses and doctors who look after us, but what is it really like from the point of view of a junior doctor. Along comes Adam Kay with his laugh out loud This is Going to Hurt (Picador) that was released in early September. In recent weeks Adam has won the Books Are My Bag Non-Fiction Book of the Year, the Books Are My Bag Readers' Choice Award and also Winner of Blackwell's Debut Book of the Year. Not a bad return for a debut about a junior doctor. Actually it is just brilliant in every respect.There were times when I was reading this that I was laughing so much I had tears in my eyes not sure what my fellow passengers must have thought on my daily commute to and from work. But at the same time I had tears for very different reasons. Just the pure emotion and also heartbreaking. These are the diaries of Adam Kay when he was a junior doctor for six years.I said to one of my bookish friends on Twitter that I was going to send a copy to Jeremy Hunt (Health Secretary), well I can now reveal here that I actually did just that, whether the book actually reached him personally is another matter. But I carried out my threat as I believe he and other government ministers should read this outstanding and brilliant book.Here are his diary entries from 2004 to 2010 after which he gave up his job suddenly and very sadly. Now he writes and my goodness does he write. Though Kay is extremely funny in his writing there is a very serious side to this book and he uses it to send a message to those in power and how the NHS is on the verge of collapse despite those in government denying this for their own agenda.There is one part that has stayed with me and it is when Adam has just ended yet another very long shift on the wards and is so exhausted that he falls asleep in his car. He has not left the car park at the hospital. He is woken up by the registrar on Christmas Day asking why he is late for his next shift. Then he falls asleep at various points. If this does not get a message across as to just how hard these doctors and nurses are working and to the point of sheer mental and physical exhaustion, then nothing will. These dedicated people are not just human they are super human. They are there to put us back together when things go wrong for whatever reason.I am not one for watching these medical dramas on TV as I have seen them working at first hand on my over recent years and to me each and every one is a hero and should treated as such.If you read one book before the end of this year, please make it This is Going to Hurt I promise you will fall over laughing it will make you cry laughing and it will make you angry at the way the NHS is being managed. It is one of my 15 books of 2017. You will not be disappointed. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Poignant book. Moving and serious yet hilariously funny at the same time. I’d love to read all the bits he missed out too! All politicians and senior hospital staff and medical students should have it as compulsory reading.I think he must have been a wonderful practitioner, what a loss to medicine.

"#NOF means fractured Neck of Femur fracture. If you thought # was a hashtag, you're banned from reading the rest of this book".For the most part this book is filled with hilarious anecdotes such as that. A mockery of the misconceptions of medicine, a giggle at some of the silly things people do and say, an account of many objects rammed into suspicious places, and a personal insight into the experiences of one junior doctor. Of course names and dates have been changed a little bit - and Harry Potter fans will enjoy the name changes nodding to characters we know well - but the stories are ostensibly true.I will say as a preface that this is by no means a polite book - why should it be? It highlights many of the issues, some better known than others, which truly caring professionals face and how they overcome those challenges. Or don't. It largely does so in a funny, witty style, but you will come crashing down to Earth towards the end. It doesn't shy away from how negligent, quick fixes or plain old accidents might come about - I'm not sure I'd have a steady hand after no food or sleep for one day, least of all two with a never-ending bleep and no rest in sight. And it shows the "behind the scenes" pressures this puts on professionals at work, their perseverance to keep bouncing back and not drop out, but also the knock-on effect this can have on their personal home life and relationships as well.I've seen reviews suggesting the sarcasm can be a little bit offensive at times towards healthcare professionals who weren't doctors - midwives got a lot of stick in this book unduly (they work bloody hard and know as much as many of the doctors!) - but it seems a very realistic portrayal of what the pressure truly feels like regardless and I think, jokes aside, Kay really wanted to celebrate everyone working on the front lines of the NHS, not just the doctors.I think what Adam Kay has set out to do here with these journal entries is excellent and very important at present - we have some very skilled, genuinely caring and compassionate people working within the NHS and we should be looking after them as well as they look after us. Now if only all the people in all the right places would have a read!

Very funny but also sad. The best of his books

I absolutely loved this book and often found myself laughing out loud. Of course there were a few things that made me cringe and there were a few sad moments, but on the whole a super book! When the junior doctors were on strike I was furious at them, even more so when they were given such a large raise by the new Labour government, however, I had no idea of the long, long hours they have to work and sometimes the conditions they have to work under so I have completely changed my mind about them. These doctors are absolute heroes in my eyes, so THANK YOU Adam Kay - I am so glad that you wrote this book!

Great insight into what being a junior doctor in the NHS means

Brilliant. I couldn’t put it down. It made me laugh out loud. Respect for the junior Dr’s on the front line.

Adam Kay is a really good writer, and an even better comic. This is based on his diaries when he was a young doctor in the NHS (National Health Service UK). It has been a long time since I laughed out loud so often through the course of a book. Treat yourself - and some of your friends/family - to this wonderfully funny and moving book.

I thought its going to be a really funny book. Well, it is. But some stories are really touching, and the fact that these health professionals have to suffer the ungodly number of overtime at some point no longer funny. It is brilliant the way this book bring us to understand that doctors are human too, and often exploited by the system. Overall, a great read.

Como também médica recém-formada, muitas frases lidas até a então metade do livro parecem tiradas da minha cabeça – risada garantida. Está sendo uma leitura muito prazerosa, ainda mais por ter perdido o costume de leitura não-acadêmica após tantos anos entre pré-vestibular e faculdade.

The blurb and publicity praise the book as an adorably funny satire on the hospital business. Yes, it is funny, it is set in Great Britain, mainly in gynaecology and in the British NHS healthcare system, but it is not (actually) satire. It is an exact description of a doctor's work and, apart from a few deviations (our specialist training does not follow exactly the same pattern), it can be transferred exactly to Germany, to everything that goes wrong, to everything that is a daily burden for all employees in the healthcare system. Even many of the situations that seem very strange or even absurd to outsiders have probably been experienced in the same or a similar way by almost everyone who has worked in a hospital for a few years. I am sure that they happened in exactly the same way and were not invented by the author. In particular - and this is where the book ends - it is an indictment of the complete disregard shown by politicians for the people who work in hospitals or elsewhere on a daily basis. But in the end it doesn't matter. Even our current Minister of Health, Mr Lauterbach, would probably not change anything if he were to devote his precious time to this book at all, and would probably not even feel addressed. In this respect: absolutely worth reading, but also very depressing. Not funny.

Must read for people who are contemplating about choosing their career as a doctor. Deeply insightful, funny, heart wrenching and last but not the least a must-read book!