About this item
"Wise and witty." -- Publishers Weekly"A charming story well told." -- Kirkus Reviews"Smart, funny, charming . . . full of astute insights into the way Italy works." -- Alexander Stille"A wonderfully fun read." -- Dr. Robert Sapolsky"As funny as it is poignant. A must read for anyone who thinks they understand medicine, Italy, or humanity." -- Barbie Latza NadeauAfter completing her medical training in New York, Susan Levenstein set off for a one year adventure in Rome. Forty years later, she is still practicing medicine in the Eternal City. In Dottoressa: An American Doctor in Rome Levenstein writes, with love and exasperation, about navigating her career through the renowned Italian tangle of brilliance and ineptitude, sexism and tolerance, rigidity and chaos.Part memoir -- starting with her epic quest for an Italian medical license -- and part portrait of Italy from a unique point of view, Dottoressa is packed with vignettes that illuminate the national differences in character, lifestyle, health, and health care between her two countries. Levenstein, who has been called "the wittiest internist on earth," covers everything from hookup culture to neighborhood madmen, Italian hands-off medical training, bidets, the ironies of expatriation, and why Italians always pay their doctor's bills.
About the Author
Susan Levenstein is an American physician who has been living and working in Rome for forty years. She first fell in love with Italy in 1970, on a post-college Grand Tour around Europe, and dreamed of living there throughout her medical training at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and the Social Medical Program of Montefiore Hospital and Medical Center in the Bronx. Shortly after taking her Board Certification examination in internal medicine, she and her Italian first husband made the big move.In addition to treating an international clientele as a primary care internist, Dr. Levenstein has done extensive research in psychosomatic medicine and early childhood education, publishing more than 60 articles and book chapters and a book, Messages From Home, co-authored with her mother Phyllis Levenstein. Outside her office she enjoys blogging at Stethoscope On Rome, playing the piano, performing watsu (WATer shiatSU) , walking the streets of the most beautiful city in the world, and being the Artist's Wife to her second husband, American composer Alvin Curran. The memoir, Dottoressa: An American Doctor In Rome, is her first solo book.To learn more, go to www.stethoscopeonrome.com and www.aventinomedicalgroup.com
