Eye-Opening Books on Healthcare

Legacy is a journey through the critical intersection of racism and healthcare. At once a searing indictment of our healthcare system, a generational family memoir, and a call to action, Legacy is Dr. Blackstock’s odyssey from child to medical student to practicing physician — to finally seizing her own power as a health equity advocate against the backdrop of the pandemic and the Black Lives Matter movement.

From award-winning ProPublica reporter Marshall Allen, a primer for anyone who wants to fight the predatory health care system — and win.

A trailblazing, conversation-starting history of women’s health — from the earliest medical ideas about women’s illnesses to hormones and autoimmune diseases — brought together in a fascinating sweeping narrative.

Bringing to bear his talent for explaining complex issues in a clear, engaging way, New York Times bestselling author T. R. Reid visits industrialized democracies around the world — France, Britain, Germany, Japan, and beyond — to provide a revelatory tour of successful, affordable universal health care systems. The Healing of America is required reading for all those hoping to understand the state of health care in our country, and around the world.

Michele Harper learned to become an effective ER physician, bringing insight and empathy to every patient encounter. The Beauty in Breaking is the poignant true story of Harper’s journey toward self-healing. Each of the patients Harper writes about taught her something important about recuperation and recovery. As she shines a light on the systemic disenfranchisement of the patients she treats as they struggle to maintain their health and dignity, Harper comes to understand the importance of allowing ourselves to make peace with the past as we draw support from the present.

An urgent investigation into the experience of seeking an abortion after the fall of Roe v. Wade, and the life-threatening consequences of being denied reproductive freedom. “An absolute must-read; tell your friends; buy it for your family; sit with it on your own. This is storytelling we need” (Rebecca Traister, bestselling author of Good and Mad).

America’s Bitter Pill is Steven Brill’s acclaimed book on how the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, was written, how it is being implemented, and, most important, how it is changing — and failing to change — the rampant abuses in the healthcare industry. The result: A surprising new vision of how we can fix American healthcare so that it stops draining the bank accounts of our families and our businesses, and the federal treasury. “A tour de force … a comprehensive and suitably furious guide to the political landscape of American healthcare … persuasive, shocking” (The New York Times).

The first full history of Black America’s shocking mistreatment as unwilling and unwitting experimental subjects at the hands of the medical establishment. No one concerned with issues of public health and racial justice can afford not to read this masterful book.

A grand, devastating portrait of three generations of the Sackler family, famed for their philanthropy, whose fortune was built by Valium and whose reputation was destroyed by OxyContin. From the prize-winning and bestselling author of Say Nothing.

A landmark investigation of patient deaths at a New Orleans hospital ravaged by Hurricane Katrina — and the suspenseful portrayal of the quest for truth and justice — from a Pulitzer Prize-winning physician and reporter.

Is there ever a good time to have a heart attack? Why do kids born in the summer get diagnosed more often with A.D.H.D.? How are marathons harmful for your health, even when you’re not running? Does timing, circumstance, or luck impact your health care? This groundbreaking book reveals the hidden side of medicine and how unexpected — but predictable — events can profoundly affect our health.

From an award-winning writer at the New York Times Magazine and a contributor to the 1619 Project comes a landmark book that tells the full story of racial health disparities in America, revealing the toll racism takes on individuals and the health of our nation.

Here is the inspiring story of how Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, alongside a team of researchers, parents, friends, and community leaders, discovered that the children of Flint, Michigan, were being exposed to lead in their tap water — and then battled her own government and a brutal backlash to expose that truth to the world. Paced like a scientific thriller, What the Eyes Don’t See reveals how misguided austerity policies, broken democracy, and callous bureaucratic indifference placed an entire city at risk. It is a tale of hope about how one city came together to fight for justice, self-determination, and the right to build a better world for their — and all of our — children.

Revelatory, deeply personal, and utterly relevant, Voluntary Madness is a controversial work that unveils the state of mental healthcare in the United States from the inside out. When Norah Vincent found herself emotionally drained and severely depressed, she boldly committed herself to three different facilities — a big-city hospital, a private clinic in the Midwest, and finally an upscale retreat in the South. Voluntary Madness is the chronicle of Vincent’s journey through the world of the mentally ill as she struggles to find her own health and happiness.