Losing Face’ tells the story of Kathy Torpie’s long journey of recovery as she struggles to cope with life changing multiple trauma following a head on collision with a drunk driver.

Kathy has experienced the health sector as a critical care patient, a long term in patient, a short term elective surgery patient, and as an out patient, in public and private care. In ‘Losing Face’, she takes the reader on a journey through the alien and often terrifying world of the hospital as experienced by the patient. It is a deeply intimate view of the patient experience. One that is often hidden by more visible physical trauma.

As a patient, Kathy encountered a broad spectrum of health care professionals in a wide variety of circumstances in New Zealand, Australia and the United States. She was left with new insights about the potentially powerful impact - both positive and negative - that the clinician/patient relationship can have on important clinical outcomes, on patient safety, and on patient satisfaction.

“This should be a recommended read for every medical and allied Health Science student and any medical professional who works with trauma patients”

Excerpts • What Medical Professionals Say