This Is Going to Hurt

Secret Diaries of a Young Doctor

By: Adam Kay

Narrated by: Adam Kay

Now an AMC+ series starring Ben Whishaw

The acclaimed multimillion-copy bestseller, This Is Going to Hurt is Adam Kay’s equally "blisteringly funny" (Boston Globe) and “heartbreaking” (New Yorker) secret diaries of his years as a young doctor.

Welcome to 97-hour weeks. Welcome to life and death decisions. Welcome to a constant tsunami of bodily fluids. Welcome to earning less than the hospital parking meter. Wave goodbye to your friends and relationships. Welcome to the life of a first-year doctor.

Scribbled in secret after endless days, sleepless nights, and missed weekends, comedian and former medical resident Adam Kay’s This Is Going to Hurt provides a no-holds-barred account of his time on the front lines of medicine.

Hilarious, horrifying, and heartbreaking by turns, this is everything you wanted to know—and more than a few things you didn’t—about life on and off the hospital ward.

And yes, it may leave a scar.

©2019 Adam Kay (P)2022 HarperCollins Publishers

Powerful

As someone about to start medical school and a new mom who recently struggled through my own journey on the labor ward, these stories resonated with me - the author had me laughing out loud one moment and then crying the next. Thank you to the author for sharing his story.

Funny short stories! Very much enjoyed!

Adam did a great job narrating his book. The stories he told were hilarious, shocking and sometimes sad. Great idea on a book. I thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend to everyone else.

Very Funny

Honest & funny this book made me LOL often. It also highlights the pitfalls of healthcare in a free market (US) as well as social systems (UK). After endless brutal years of work and scathing sarcasm, the book ends rather abruptly. The epilogue has a strange feel. It talks about doctors, income, politics, and sacrifice. Unfortunately, Kay complains but falls woefully short in his responsibility to allow socialized medicine to own its innate shortcomings.

Eye Opening

Looking for humorous content, I noticed this book and decided to try it. As with most humorous doctor stories, there are those stories with humor, those with wisdom, those that make you think about religion, politics, etc., and those that will tear your heart apart. Those stories are within this book.

A M A Z I N G

I am a child and on my parent’s frend’s acount but wow! This is great! Laughing actively and read or listened to I guess at least 20 times, never gets boring! I also recommend Adam Kay’s other books!

Very Enlightening

I really enjoyed this book. I learned a lot about NHS doctors in the UK. One thing that really surprised me is the incredible low pay these guys get. That's really depressing and yet I like the fact that they aren't in it for the money. One thing that became extremely clear to me however is why my Aussie customers call the Brits "The Whingeing Poms" they truly are a whiny bunch. I do take into consideration the style that this book was written in, and I enjoyed the satirical humor, but there is no doubt in my mind now that the Brits indeed are a whiny bunch lol.

Amazing

As an OBGYN physician 3 months out if residency he’ll. I feel heard, I feel seen, this was therapy.

Impactful

As a nurse who began work during the pandemic I feel a sense of camaraderie with Adam. Thank you for sharing these stories with us. I went from feeling heavy from the hard stories, and laughing at the hilarity of patient scenarios

Great read

We’ll written, funny, sad and impactful. I’m so glad he tried to make a difference in health care vs. just writing about it. Well done.

Accurate, spot on, funny and thoughtful

After spending 30 years of my life as a Respiratory Therapist I felt a kinship to the author. His tales are hilarious and can’t be scripted. The tragedies are real and can never be forgotten. Personally, I suffer from PTSD from working trauma for so long. I get it, I also quit and never looked back. We are all responsible for creating change. This author did an excellent job for broader discussion.