Pediatrician–author to talk on grief and gratitude

Humanities in Medicine talk and book signing by Carolyn Roy-Bornstein on Feb. 13

February 6, 2013

Massachusetts pediatrician Carolyn Roy-Bornstein, MD, found herself on the parent’s side of the stretcher when her 17-year-old son Neil was hit by a teenage drunk driver. He survived, but has lived with traumatic brain injury ever since. On Wednesday, Feb. 13, the Humanities in Medicine Committee of the Lamar Soutter Library will host Dr. Roy-Bornstein (right), who will discuss and sign copies of her new book Crash: A Mother, a Son, and the Journey from Grief to Gratitude.

In the memoir, Roy-Bornstein recounts how she came to understand and deal with the world she so easily navigated in a white coat from the new and unfamiliar perspective of a parent with a critically injured child. As her son recovered, she began speaking out about traumatic brain injury and underage drinking to students, health care professionals and civic groups, and became an ambassador with the Brain Injury Association of Massachusetts. Roy-Bornstein is a prolific writer who publishes a monthly health column in the national newsletter Pediatrics for Parents, and whose essays and short stories have appeared in many medical and literary journals and anthologies.

Her talk will begin at 6 p.m. in the library’s Rare Book Room, following a reception with light refreshments at 5:30 p.m. Copies of Crash: A Mother, a Son, and the Journey from Grief to Gratitude will be available for purchase. Email Nancy Linnehan for further information.

The Humanities in Medicine Committee, which comprises faculty and staff from a range of disciplines, oversees the Humanities in Medicine Collection and works together with students to forge stronger connections among the sciences, humanities and the world of the clinical encounter.