This is the tale of two diseases both sneaking up on the unwary and both presenting itself in many guises.
Dr. Abraham Verghese is a doctor of medicine specializing in infectious diseases. One of the diseases that he sees quite frequently these days is AIDS. Verghese is a diagnostician of the old school using all his senses as well as his intellect to make a cohesive picture of the all the major and minuscule signs and symptoms that a patient presents to help get the sense of the disease process that is laying the patient low. If the picture is not clear when he first sees a person with time more information will always be available and thus so will the diagnosis. Patience is the answer for these problems.
A second insidious disease is that of addiction and Verghese learns more about this from a student and friend than he did in medical school. Since childhood Abraham has had an interest in tennis. He and his family have moved to El Paso for a new start because he and his wife have realized that perhaps their life together is coming to an end. One of the first people Abraham befriend is David Smith a fourth year medical student who was once a professional tennis player. At the hospital Abraham is the mentor but on the tennis court he is the student and David is the teacher. They get together to play frequently.
Before long David shares with Abraham that he is a recovering cocaine addict. While Abraham is very astute with physical diagnosis he only knows to take David at face value and they become friends. They have much in common, medicine, tennis and loneliness but addiction relapses like AIDS has symptoms that appears long before the actual diagnosis is made.Abraham Verghese is a poetical writer, both in his medical descriptions and his tennis talk. Unfortunately I only understand medicine, but it was enough for me.
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