The Deadly Dinner Party: and Other Medical Detective Stories »

Jonathan A. Edlow, M.D., F.A.C.P., is vice chair of emergency medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and associate professor of medicine, Harvard Medical School. He is the author of the award-winning Bull's Eye: Unraveling the Medical Mystery of Lyme Disease and Stroke. He lives in Newtonville, MA.

Picking up where Berton Roueché’s The Medical Detectives left off, The Deadly Dinner Party presents fifteen edge-of-your-seat, real-life medical detective stories written by a practicing physician. Award-winning author Jonathan Edlow, M.D., shows the doctor as detective and the epidemiologist as elite sleuth in stories that are as gripping as the best thrillers.

In these stories a notorious stomach bug turns a suburban dinner party into a disaster that almost claims its host; a diminutive woman routinely eats more than her football-playing boyfriend but continually loses weight; a young executive is diagnosed with lung cancer, yet the tumors seem to wax and wane inexplicably. Written for the lay person who wishes to better grasp how doctors decipher the myriad clues and puzzling symptoms they often encounter, each story presents a very different case where doctors must work to find the accurate diagnosis before it is too late. Edlow uses his unique ability to relate complex medical concepts in a writing style that is clear, engaging and easily understandable. The resulting stories both entertain us and teach us much about medicine, its history and the subtle interactions among pathogens, humans, and the environment.

Publishers Weekly

Mimicking the style of his favorite genre, the detective story, author and doctor Edlow (Bull's Eye: Unraveling the Medical Mystery of Lyme Disease) retells 15 stories of "shoe-leather epidemiology" that delve into the complex world of diagnostic medicine. In the title story, three cases of botulism are traced, with the work of physicians, local health department officials, and CDC representatives, to a jar of oil-packed garlic. Other chapters cover typhoid fever in restaurant orange juice, gastrointestinal infestation via fish tank water, and illnesses caused by excess vitamins A and D. Readers, especially those already alarmed over everyday pathogens, will find plenty to worry about, including herbal teas grandfathered out of FDA regulations; sudden changes in diets that may, literally, plug up your pipes; and all-natural, fresh-pressed cider that may harbor dangerous e. coli. Readers will also find that every medical diagnosis is a puzzle to be solved, often by gathering and analyzing data with the help of a team. Much like a true-life version of television's House M.D., these fast-paced, detail-heavy stories will prove compelling for fans of mystery and medicine.
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Pt. 1 Human Meets Pathogen

1 The Deadly Dinner Party 3

2 Everywhere That Mary Went 18

3 The Baby and the Bathwater 34

4 Rubbed the Wrong Way 46

5 The Forbidden Fruit 58

Pt. 2 The External Environment

6 Two Ticks from Jersey 75

7 An Airtight Case 88

8 Monday Morning Fever 102

9 The Case of the Wide-Eyed Boy 116

Pt. 3 The Internal Milieu

10 A Study in Scarlet 131

11 The Case of the Overly Hot Honeymoon 144

12 Feeling His Oats 158

13 The Case of the Unhealthy Health Food 170

14 Little Luisa's Blinding Headache 184

15 Too Much of a Good Thing 197

Sources 211

Index 237