Long before the hit TV show E.R., emergency room doctor Mark Brown decided that the world just had to know about real life in a hospital's E.R.The emergency room is a cauldron of human emotions. The anguish, fear, need, and gore is wearing. As the protective layer of the self is weakened, the pain seeps through and begins to stain the soul. The protective layer grows thicker. But the patients’ needs call out to a sensitive heart, and a balance is struck. Survival in this place requires a deep kindness nestled in a very dark sense of humor, and a strong faith tempered with cynicism. The people who work in this place refer to it as the Pit. What follows is a collection of true stories from all over the country about what the ER doors bring. These stories are irreverent, funny, horrifying, and heartbreaking. They will buffet you. These stories are presented randomly, not neatly categorized as one might desire but in the disorderly manner in which the doors might bring them. They are written not by writers and reporters but in the words of the doctors, nurses, and paramedics who were there.—From the Introduction