Dr Mira Harrison-Woolrych’s debut novel taps into doctors’ “primal fear that you won’t be able to do everything you can for your patient”.
Doctors doing their best to care for patients in a rundown hospital in an underfunded health system – sound familiar?
Dr Mira Harrison-Woolrych, of the Dunedin School of Medicine, has just published her first novel, based on her experiences as a junior doctor in NHS hospitals in the United Kingdom in the late 1980s. But many of the themes and challenges are the same as those facing her colleagues in Dunedin decades later.
“The story starts in an old, dilapidated hospital where things are falling apart, with doctors trying to deliver the best care they can to patients. On the other side of the world, decades on, here’s another hospital that’s crumbling to bits, that’s underfunded and under pressure, where doctors are trying to do their best in a public health system.
“As the people of Dunedin fight for their public hospital to be funded appropriately, doctors and health care workers continue to struggle to provide the best possible clinical care inside buildings that aren’t fit for purpose.”
A Research Coordinator in the Department of Women’s and Children’s Health, Mira is a trained obstetrician and the author of the Admissions short story collections about women working in a public hospital.
She describes writing as her “side hustle”, but her passion for story telling is clear and she has been writing from a young age.
Mira is delighted the novel that “has been in my head for 30 years” is now a reality. Written under the pen name Mira Harrison, One in Three is the coming-of-age story of Dr James Hartman struggling with the demands and long hours of his first year on the job in NHS hospitals. Part of the story centres on a relationship he has with his surgical registrar, New Zealander Ainslie Campbell.
While the characters and story are fictional, the hospital settings reflect Birmingham-born Mira’s experiences.
She well remembers her first weekend on call as a junior doctor in a Southampton hospital in 1989, with 14 cardiac arrest callouts over the weekend.
“I was kneeling next to a patient, holding his hand, not sure what else to do as my colleagues were doing the resuscitation.
“Whatever you’ve learnt as a medical student never prepares you for that. It’s very frightening and very traumatic. And I thought, one day I really want to write about this.”
While some things have improved for junior doctors, such as reduced hours, hospital inductions and more support, there are still a lot of stresses and challenges. Mira’s message to doctors is “look after yourself and each other”.
Many of her colleagues who have clinical and academic roles have been interested in the novel’s progress and have been popping in to see the advance copies of the “book baby”.
While she hopes doctors will read One in Three and think about the health system they are working in, at its heart this novel is a story for everyone.
“It’s for anyone who enjoys a coming-of-age story. I’ve gone to a lot of effort to make it not too technical. It’s quite a dark tale, but there’s also a love story at the centre of the book. I hope it’s an enjoyable read and a page turner.”
Not one to sit on her hands, Mira has already written a second novel – it’s set 50 years in the future and focuses on a young woman who is a climate change refugee, working in a hotel on an unnamed Pacific island – and is working on her third.
Mira will be attending the London launch of One in Three in late November, which is also when the book should be available at Dunedin’s Paper Plus, the University Book Shop, and online. A local book launch will also be held at the Dunedin Public Hospital on 20 December.
Read an earlier story about Mira and her writing
- Kōrero by Andrea Jones, Team Leader, Divisional Communications