Kay left the medical profession in 2010, after six years of working through the ranks of junior doctorship, so he was finishing as Pemberton was getting into his stride. His ‘Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor’ were irresistible to me. He has since become a comedian and award-winning scriptwriter.

Pemberton came across as a big fan of the NHS, even though critical of its governance, and is still practising within it as a psychiatrist.Īdam Kay left the medical profession as a senior registrar before reaching a consultancy post. These were later collected into several books published between 20 and they combined wry humour with more sombre scenes and a bit of politics. Some years ago, I remember enjoying Max Pemberton’s columns for the Daily Telegraph which started in his first year as a junior doctor. The memoirs of ‘junior doctors’ – an all-encompassing term that includes all doctors except consultants – are completely different. They too started off fresh from medical school as junior doctors. These consultant surgeons really are the superheroes of the medical world, but don’t forget they also had a long slog to get to there too. These books were written by surgeons who’ve reached the zenith of their careers they concentrate on particular operations – often pioneering, and we meet the teams involved as well as the patients, whom the surgeons often get to know over months or years of treatment. I love reading medical memoirs, we’ve featured neurosurgeon Henry Marsh’s two volumes here at Shiny (see my review of Do No Harm here), and heart surgeon Stephen Westaby’s book was a great read for me earlier this year.

Books like this is going to hurt