The Beatles, Babies and Broken Bodies: My Memoir Navigating Canada's Healthcare System

by Pat Zehr

What does it take to be a frontline healthcare worker? Dedication, perseverance, strength, the standard superlatives of a hero. Add being a nurse in Canada’s northern region and practising medicine as a woman, and the backstory gets more dramatic. From vivid descriptions of the far north to dealing with misogyny in medical school and beyond, Pat Zehr’s poignant memoir is especially relevant today.

By sharing her story, Zehr touches on pressing socio-economic issues, including disparities in healthcare and the ongoing havoc of COVID-19. Zehr’s medical career, first as a nurse and then as an OB-GYN, is both a compelling journey of self-discovery and a lens on issues within the Canadian healthcare system. She shares the challenges of being a frontline worker, advocate, and patient. After decades of providing care, Zehr became debilitated herself and embarked on a new search for treatment that led to a second calling as a yoga instructor.

Compelling vignettes—and a love for The Beatles, whose music serves as a touchstone throughout—celebrate the beauty of remote regions while revealing the toll of providing healthcare and coping with its inherent heartbreak. Zehr doesn’t hold back, whether it’s about mental and physical breakdown (and being a workaholic) or her devotion to The Beatles (and yes, she does have a favourite Beatle).

265 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 16, 2022

Reviews

[Heli · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed reading about Pat’s experiences in the Canadian medical system over the last 40+ years. Some important insights about how different practice is in northern and remote areas of our country.

[Wendy Payne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you Pat for an honest and open autobiography. Your shared experience rings true.

[E. Paul Zehr · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read a fair bit but don't write many reviews. I have to make an exception here, though, because, full disclosure, my sister wrote this book. But that's not truly why I'm writing right here and now. Her memoir stands alone and is a compelling, insightful, and inspirational read. And maddening in many places. It's maddening for things like the casual misogyny of medical training in the 80s to the indifference of the medical system. It's insightful and inspirational because it tells a real story and shares the real experiences of someone who has seen life from more then Joni Mitchell's both sides. Here as a nurse, a physician, a caregiver and someone who needed help for her own healthcare. I learned a lot about life by reading this book. While my own writing uses superheroes as foils for science, my sister has always been one of my real-life heroes. Her memoir shows why.

[Angie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This memoir shares Zehr's career journey and the many interesting stories that came with each stage of it, many of which go nicely with a Beatles tune.

Zehr began her nursing career in NWT and fell in love with northern health care, something that is challenging in its own unique way. The book chronicles her career path and the anecdotal commentary and case files that made her life interesting along the way. Later, once she completes a degree in medicine she returns to a different northern town, Sault Ste. Marie where she is one of only a handful of OB/GYNs in a small town. Throughout the story, Zehr demonstrates her knowledge both of medicine in a practical sense, but also a deep understanding of the challenges Canada's medical system has faced and continues to face over the last several decades. Through her writing, she advocates a stronger system to provide equitable care across the country, no matter how far north the medical centre may be!

Zehr's memoir also explores themes such as feminism and sexism in the medical field, work-life balance issues in the medical field, and the importance of caring for physician health so that doctors can stay healthy and keep their communities healthy. I think my favourite part about the story though was the patient vignettes woven throughout. It is one of the things I love most about medical memoirs because you almost get several short memoirs in one. I love the snippets of people's lives, often in their most stressful or traumatic moments, and getting the chance to just peek in on that moment from the perspective of someone who is not only witnessing it, but also has a strong understanding of what events may have led to this problem occurring. The author does a great job of sharing these stories, some of which date back several decades!

This was my top selection in this category and is definitely one I would recommend!