County: Life, Death, and Politics at Chicagos Public Hospital

Synopsis

The amazing tale of "County" is the story of one of America's oldest and most unusual urban hospitals. From it's inception as a "Poor House" dispensing free medical care to indigents, Chicago's Cook County Hospital has been both a renowned teaching hospital and the healthcare provider of last resort for the city's uninsured. County covers more than thirty years of its history, beginning in the late 1970s when the author began his internship, to the "Final Rounds" when the enormous iconic Victorian hospital building was replaced and hundreds of former trainees gathered to bid it an emotional farewell. Ansell writes of the hundreds of doctors who wentthrough the rigorous training process with him, sharing hisvision of saving the world and of resurrecting a hospital onthe verge of closing.County is about people, fromAnsells mentors, including the legendary Quentin Young,to the multitude of patients whom he and Countys medicalstaff labored to diagnose and heal. It is a story aboutpolitics, from contentious union strikes to battles againstpatient dumping, and public health, depicting the AIDScrisis and the opening of Countys HIV/AIDS clinic, thefirst in the city. Finally, it is about a young mans medical education inurban America, a comingofage story set against a backdropof race, segregation and poverty.