"An unflinching chronicle of loss that takes a hard look at the state of medical care in the United States." Kirkus ¿¿¿¿¿ "Absolutely powerful, heartbreaking, and helpful!" - Reader Review No diagnosis. No explanation from a doctor. No staging or prognosis. The beginning of eight months of nightmare. ____ One moment Melissa was in her mother's hospital room with her mother and sister, waiting for the results of a biopsy already four days overdue. The next: a nurse walked in with what looked like nuclear fallout gear and multiple IV bags to tell Melissa's mother, "Hello, Mrs. Burns. I'm here with your chemotherapy to treat your cancer." The tears started. The nightmare began, and then unwound over an eight-month period of necessary grief...and totally unnecessary suffering. In a real-world story that is all-too-relevant, Not In Vain, A Promise Kept chronicles, in terrible detail, the repeated failures of a broken health care system. Medical mistakes, poor communication, false hope. The helplessness of a woman watching her mother slowly die-and, far worse, suffering pain and indignities that did not have to happen and never should have: suffering brought on not by disease but by human error and medical mismanagement. Indignities that carved Melissa's mother away one small piece at a time until finally, it was just the two of them, holding hands late at night in the hospital with her mother suffering yet again another side effect of cancer, and a promise asked: "Tell them what happened. Tell them how to keep it from happening again." The promise was given. The promise is now being kept. "This is a book that you will not regret picking up!" OnlineBookClub.org "Readers will cheer..." Kirkus Reviews "Mullamphy does such a masterful job..." Foreword Clarion Reviews