The Second Opinion by Michael Palmer

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Dr. Thea Sperelakis, diagnosed as a teen with Asperger’s syndrome, has always been an outsider. She has a brilliant medical mind, and a remarkable recall of details, but her difficulty in dealing with hidden agendas and interpersonal conflicts have led her to leave the complex, money-driven... read more

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Thea's father, Dr Petros Sperelakis, Director of the Sperelakis Center for Diagnostic Medicine is suddenly stricken by a stroke and in a coma with locked in syndrome. Daughter Thea who's a doctor with Doctor's without borders in Africa flies in from the Congo to be with her father. Thea is a brilliant doctor as are her twin siblings but Thea who has Asperger's Syndrome has been away for many years.
Thea has been somewhat alienated from her family except from her brother Dimitri who also has Asperger's Syndrom, except that his disease is more severe and has rendered him housebound.Thea comes home to find that Dimitri is an IT genius who seldom leaves his room and to a family in turmoil, her father in a coma and a medical community who would just as well let her father die. Thea has found a way to communicate with her father and he with her, to the consternation of much of the medical staff and her twin siblings.
Thea embarks on a quest to see why the medical community doesn't want her father to get well and to see who if anyone is responsible for her father's condition. She encounters a hospital security guard who comes to her aid and believes in her. Their friendship leads to a romantic relationship while Thea probes into the hospital funding, it's contributors and donors who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness that is suddenly cured by miracle drugs during their cancer treatment and therapy at the Sperelakis Institute.

Thea with the aid of Dan Cotton the hospital security guard and a former cop puts her life in danger in her quest to find the truth. Someone is trying to kill her to keep her from finding the truth and that someone is her brother, the genuis Dimitri Sperelakis, who wreaks his own type of revenge on his father who never understood his condition and his disease. Dimitri manipulates some of the medical staff and engages in sinister practices, providing wealthy patients with fake medical reports, x-rays, MRI's and scans belonging to other sick and dying patients with similar body builds as the wealthy patients and presenting them as their own. After their supposed treatment and recovery, the wealthy patients endow the hospital with large sums of money in gratitude for their miraculous recovery. Some of this money makes it's way to the doctors who are on the take as well as to Dimitri.
Dr Petros Sperelakis had been on the verge of discovering the scam, therefore Dimitri and the crooked doctors had to make sure that Petros could never speak of this to anyone.

Characters/People edit see section history

Dr. Thea Sperelakis: worked for Doctors Without Borders in Africa
Dr. Petros Sperelakis: Thea's father/Internal medicine specialist/founder of the Sperelakis Center for Diagnostic Medicine
Dimitri Sperelakis: Thea's brother, genius with Asberger's
Dr. Niko Sperelakis: Associate Professor of cardiac surgery, twin to Selene, brother to Thea
Dr. Selene Sperelakis: Hand surgeon, twin to Niko
Sean Flowers: employed by Hayley Long for 'fact finding'
Jack Kalishar: wealthy pancreatic cancer patient who was cured
Lydia Thibideau: Physician reknowned for treating various cancers with experimental drugs
Hayley Long: wealthy pancreatic cancer patient on experimental drugs
Dan Cotton: hospital security guard/former cop
Scott Hartnett: Physician treating Petros Sperelakis

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Doctors Without Borders: Add a description of this organization.

First Sentence edit see section history

Multiple contusions and abrasions...Fractured pelvis...

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

Michael Palmer (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Original Language: English
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Country: USA
Publication Date: (February 17, 2009
ISBN: 0312343558
Page Count: 384

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Dewey: 813.54

Notes for Parents edit see section history

Reading Level: Adults

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Subjects edit see section history

Books › Mystery & Thrillers › Thrillers › Medical
Books › Literature & Fiction › Genre Fiction › Medical

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The Second Opinion (edit title/settings)

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