In Search of Self, in the Service of Others: Reflections of a Retired Physician on Medicine, the Bible and the Jews

The life of Holocaust survivor Dr. Heinz Hartmann is a fascinating one indeed, from escaping Hitler’s concentration camps as a young man to making house-calls as a general practitioner in America. As chronicled in his compelling 1986 autobiography, Once a Doctor, Always a Doctor: The Memories of a German-Jewish Immigrant Physician , Hartmann completed his medical studies in the 1930s, when the Nazis were in power. Just two weeks after his wedding to the beautiful Herta, a young nurse, Hartmann and scores of other Jewish men were taken by the Nazis to Buchenwald. It was these horrifying experiences that he drew upon when interviewed by Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation in its research for the movie Schindler’s List as well as for libraries internationally.In this touching new book, Hartmann recounts his and Herta’s escape from Nazi Germany, their loving relationship, and her fatal struggle with pancreatic cancer. He also examines the many years of love and care-giving he devoted to his physically and mentally retarded son, Michael, who was born healthy but experienced a crippling reaction to a vaccination at only five and a half months of age. This enlightening and tremendously personal memoir also offers the doctor’s thoughts on the future of medicine, what it means to be Jewish in modern society, and special thoughts about the people who have influenced his life.