About HEALING HEARTS: A Memoir of a Female Heart Surgeon
Dr.Kathy Magliato gives us a
rare glimpse into the realities of being a cardiothoracic surgeon. Readers will
be instantly pulled into her fast-paced world—struggling to fit in as a female
in the biggest boys club of them all, learning Operating Room etiquette (e.g.
the lead surgeon always stands on the patient’s right side), and skillfully
juggling a full family life as
the wife of a liver transplant surgeon (they have bedside tables cluttered with
pagers and cell phones that ring throughout the night) and the mother of two
young boys.
Amidst the chaos, we come to know many of those patients
whose lives Dr. Magliato has touched: a 94-year-old woman with heart failure, whose
friends and neighbors call “Grandma” even though she has no children, a baby
born with a hole in her heart, and a 35-year-old movie producer who saves her
own life by recognizing the symptoms of a heart attack. Through it all, Dr.
Magliato remains professional yet compassionate, treating her patients’ hearts
in both the literal and figurative senses of the word.
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About the Author
Kathy E.
Magliato, MD, is
currently the director of women’s cardiac services at Saint John’s Health
Center in Santa Monica, California, and an attending cardiothoracic surgeon at
Torrance Memorial Medical Center in Torrance, California, where she is
developing a women’s heart center to address the cardiac needs of female
patients. She lives in Pacific Palisades with her husband and their two
children.
Dr. Magliato is one of a handful of female heart surgeons
practicing in the world today. As a member of an even more exclusive group—she
is one of the few cardiothoracic surgeons specially trained to perform heart
transplants. She recounts the day when she first realized she wanted to be a
heart surgeon: “when I wrapped my hand around that heart…that was it for me.
Love at first sight. Love at first touch. I knew this was exactly what I
wanted. To touch the human heart everyday.”
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