Can You Diagnose a Miracle?

About the Book

When it comes to children with cancer, Dr. Jon Bock is a relentless advocate; he never gives up the fight. But it’s not an easy job with pain and death regularly involved. It’s been frustrating watching children die of cancer. He and the other doctors in the group can only hope for a miracle—a cure for children’s cancer. A new type of toxic combination therapy is developed to treat a malignant cancer that Dr. Bock has never cured before. Challenged by a colleague to “bring him a miracle,” Bock and his associates use the new therapy on eight-year-old Teddie Thompson to destroy all evidence of the cancer in the face of life-threatening complications—and they succeed. Was Bock’s first cure of the cancer a miracle? Despite mixed opinions among his associates, he returns to the colleague who challenged him and asks, “Can you diagnose a miracle?” Based on observations of cases and colleagues during the 1970s, Can You Diagnose a Miracle? demonstrates the early frustrations of pediatric cancer treatment and the strides that have been made in the field today.

About the Author

Dan Lane is board-certified in pediatric hematology-oncology with special interests in psychological care of children with cancer. His career spanned the era of cancer therapy described in Can You Diagnose a Miracle? Semi-retired, Lane does private consulting and writes about the history of Texas, where he currently lives.