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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How do Fran and Carey feel about Taylor's new doctor?

2. How do the hospital staff, except Javier, feel about Patrick?

3. When Sharon is rotated out, who is Taylor's new doctor?

4. How does Patrick feel about his condition?

5. Why do Fran and Carey dislike Sharon Crandell?

Short Essay Questions

1. What happens to Taylor at the end of Chapter 6?

2. What is Armando's condition, at the beginning of Chapter 4?

3. Why do Fran and Carey want to take Taylor off of the ventilator?

4. What is the situation of the Poarch family at the end of Chapter 2?

5. What condition does Patrick have?

6. Why did Armando leave Fort Worth to go to Madisonville?

7. What is the situation of Armando's family?

8. How does Javier feel about Patrick?

9. How do the Poarches feel about the doctor they receive when they first arrive at Hermann?

10. What happens to Fran at the end of May?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Most of the patients Belkin discusses are poor, and cannot afford their medical care. What do you think a hospital should be required to do in situations when people cannot afford their own care? Should the hospitals be responsible for giving people all of the care they need, regardless of the cost, and give the uninsured equal treatment? Or should there be a limit to what hospitals are required to provide, due to financial limitations? Be sure to cite specific examples from the text to support your thesis.

Essay Topic 2

Analyze the personality and actions of Oria Dismuke. Do you feel that she is a bad mother, as many of the hospital staff do, for not being more involved in her son's life? Or is she, as she claims, simply exhausted by working so much, and giving her son's care over to people who are more capable, and know him better than she does? Do you think her reaction to her son's death is normal and healthy? Why or why not? Be sure to cite specific examples from the text to support your thesis.

Essay Topic 3

Belkin states that the book is about "making choices, and living with them." How well do you think the book conveys this message? Why? Is there anything that Belkin could have done differently to convey the message better? If so, what? Who has to live with the decisions that are made in the book? Be sure to cite specific examples from the text to support your thesis.

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This section contains 950 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample