Medical technology meets rural values of simplicity, home health remedies, and unwavering faith in divine providence when a country-boy-turned-country-doctor returns to his roots. House Calls and Hitching Posts is a sometimes humorous and often intimate account of Dr. Elton Lehman's 36 years practicing medicine among the Amish of Ohio, for which he was named Country Doctor of the Year. This is the story of a beloved doctor working among a respected people and the insights they exchanged, told by someone who knows both firsthand. Hoover's anecdotal style takes readers on house calls and into the private moments between doctors and patients. Joe brings his dismembered fingers to the office in a coffee can filled with kerosene. Katie delivers a boy for the doctor's first home-birth. And three-year-old Davy rallies to overcome a life-threatening illness at birth, only to be crushed under a tractor wheel.
Hoover captures in sometimes local vernacular the joys and dilemmas of a family practitioner among a rural and predominantly-Amish community. Includes many photographs from Dr. Lehman's distinguished career. A country-boy-turned-country-doctor goes on house calls among the Amish of eastern Ohio in this warm collection of true-life tales. Alert to his patients' preferences to have their babies born close to home, and their illnesses and injuries treated in a home-like atmosphere, Dr. Elton Lehman also created a treatment and birthing center in the hills of Wayne County, Ohio. From these years of medical technology meeting rural values come these unforgettable stories: Joe brings his dismembered fingers to the office in a coffee can filled with kerosene; Dozens of babies are born with Dr. Lehman's help; Katie's little boy is his first at-home birth; Three-year-old Davy rallies to overcome a life-threatening illness at birth, only to be crushed under a tractor wheel; Barb, the Amish leader's wife, joins Doc Lehman in an unusual partnership, setting aside a bedroom in her own home as an alternative "delivery" room.
Writer Hoover captures in sometimes local vernacular the joys and dilemmas of a family practitioner among a rural and predominantly-Amish community.