CUTTHROAT

In a medical memoir and exposé, a successful spinal surgeon describes his career and the legal and professional challenges that almost derailed it.  

From the start of this remembrance, orthopedic surgeon Cyr speaks about “the cutthroatbusinessmen who surround our profession” in extreme terms, calling them “predators who are waiting to devour us.” Asserting his intention to “expose conditions in our healthcare system that need an overhaul,” the author begins with his own background. A devout Christian who was born into a military family, Cyr was inclined to view his role as a doctor in terms of service rather than profit. He was inspired to take up orthopedic surgery after he had a successful knee operation following a football injury. He obtained a U.S. Air Force scholarship to pay for his expensive education, though it required him to remain in the service for 14 years and included two grueling Iraq combat deployments. He rose to the role of chief spinal surgeon and professor at the flagship U.S. Air Force hospital in Texas, where he routinely faced criticism and competition from colleagues. The legal issues that would plague his career began with the opening of his private practice, when he had to defend his right to use the name he’d chosen, which was similar to another practice’s. Many other legal issues, the author contends, resulted from counterproductive governmental regulations and insurance practices that favor corporate profits over patient welfare. Cyr is an often captivating storyteller, recounting his experiences with passion and immediacy, from intimate details of his family dynamics to the breakneck pace of his ambitious career. The role of the author’s religious faith in his dedication to medicine is also noteworthy, as when he writes that “God has surrounded me with angels and put a hand of protection over me and my family despite the constant stream of attacks I have experienced.” The tone veers toward querulousness at times, however, as in complaints about “malignant” fellow spine surgeons who disliked him, he says, because of his corporate recruiter wife’s high salary.

A forceful, if somewhat irritable, critique of the American medical system.