True Stories From the Hospitals of Commons, Roswell

Dr. Kolbaba's book offers an unconventional antidote to physician burnout: stories that remind physicians why they chose medicine. In an era when administrative burdens, electronic health records, and productivity metrics have divorced many physicians from the meaningful aspects of their work, the extraordinary stories in Physicians' Untold Stories reconnect physicians to the wonder, mystery, and profound human significance of their calling.

Dr. Scott Kolbaba

About the Author

Dr. Scott J. Kolbaba, MD is an internist at Northwestern Medicine in Wheaton, Illinois. He interviewed more than 200 physicians about their most extraordinary experiences.

Book cover

Physicians' Untold Stories

by Scott J. Kolbaba, MD4.5 stars (1018 reviews)

Miraculous experiences doctors are hesitant to share with their patients, or ANYONE!

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"I shivered. I cried. I read some out loud to the spouse. Please write more." — Amazon Review

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Medical Fact

The first successful heart transplant was performed by Dr. Christiaan Barnard in 1967 in Cape Town, South Africa. The patient lived for 18 days.

Physician Burnout & Wellness Near Commons, Roswell

Physicians practicing in Commons, Roswell, Georgia work at the intersection of modern medicine and experiences that resist explanation. In conversations that rarely leave the break room or the on-call suite, doctors in and around Commons, Roswell have reported encounters with phenomena that their training never prepared them for — from patients who describe verifiable details about events that occurred while they were clinically dead, to deathbed visions shared simultaneously by multiple family members, to recoveries that defy every prognostic model available.

The medical community in Commons, Roswell includes physicians across every stage of their careers — residents navigating the exhaustion of training, mid-career practitioners balancing clinical demands with family life, and veteran physicians carrying decades of experiences that challenge the boundaries of conventional medicine. Burnout touches all of them differently, but a common thread runs through: the desire to remember why they chose medicine in the first place, and the rare but profound moments that remind them.

Physician Burnout by Specialty

Percentage reporting at least one symptom (Medscape, 2024)

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Medical Fact

Identical twins have different fingerprints but can share the same brainwave patterns — a finding that fascinates neuroscientists studying consciousness.

Physician Wellness, Grief & Finding Meaning Near Commons, Roswell

Healing in the Southeast near Commons, Roswell, Georgia has always been communal. When someone gets sick, the church shows up with food. The neighbors mow the lawn. The coworkers donate vacation days. This social infrastructure of care isn't a substitute for medicine—it's the soil in which medicine takes root. A chemotherapy patient surrounded by a casserole-bearing community heals differently than one who faces treatment alone.

Southern physicians near Commons, Roswell, Georgia who practice in the same community for decades develop a longitudinal understanding of their patients that specialists in rotating academic positions never achieve. They attend their patients' weddings, baptisms, and funerals. They treat three generations of the same family. This continuity of care is itself a healing agent—the accumulated trust of years reduces anxiety, improves compliance, and creates a therapeutic relationship that no algorithm can replicate.

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Medical Fact

Anesthesia was first demonstrated publicly in 1846 at Massachusetts General Hospital — an event known as "Ether Day."

Faith, Medicine & the Unexplained in Commons, Roswell, Georgia

The 'God's plan' framework that many Southern patients near Commons, Roswell, Georgia bring to medical encounters can be clinically challenging. A patient who believes their illness is divine will may resist treatment, viewing medical intervention as opposition to God. The skilled Southern physician doesn't attack this framework—they reframe treatment as part of God's plan: 'God sent you to this hospital. God gave your surgeon these hands.'

The 'laying on of hands' tradition near Commons, Roswell, Georgia—practiced across denominational lines—is the South's most widespread faith-healing ritual. Neurological research suggests that compassionate human touch activates oxytocin release, reduces inflammation markers, and modulates pain perception. The laying on of hands may not transmit divine power, but it transmits something biologically measurable—and for the patient, the distinction may not matter.

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Did You Know?

The average hospital in the United States employs over 1,200 staff members and operates 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Ghost Stories and the Supernatural Near Commons, Roswell, Georgia

Appalachian ghost stories carry a medicinal quality that physicians near Commons, Roswell, Georgia encounter in their mountain patients. The granny women who delivered babies and set bones by moonlight are said to still walk the hollows, their remedies—sassafras tea, goldenseal poultice, whispered Bible verses—as real to their descendants as any prescription. In Appalachia, the line between healer and haunt was never clearly drawn.

Southern hospital cafeterias near Commons, Roswell, Georgia are unexpected settings for ghost stories, but they produce some of the most warmly told accounts. The spirit of a cook who spent thirty years feeding patients and staff is said to turn on ovens at 4 AM, adjust seasonings, and leave the kitchen smelling of biscuits before the morning crew arrives. In the South, even ghosts believe in comfort food.

Types of Phenomena in the Book

Distribution across 26 physician accounts

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Did You Know?

The Caduceus — the winged staff with two snakes — is often mistakenly used as a medical symbol; the correct symbol is the Rod of Asclepius with one snake.

Watch Dr. Kolbaba Share These Stories

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Did You Know?

The term "pandemic" comes from the Greek "pandemos," meaning "pertaining to all people."

Medical Heritage in Georgia

Georgia's medical history is anchored by the Medical College of Georgia (now Augusta University), founded in 1828 as the fifth oldest medical school in the nation. Augusta became known as a center of medical education in the antebellum South, though its history is shadowed by the documented use of enslaved people for medical experimentation, most notably by Dr. Crawford Long, who performed the first surgery using ether anesthesia in Jefferson, Georgia in 1842. Emory University School of Medicine, established in 1915 in Atlanta, became a leading research institution, and Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, opened in 1892, served as one of the largest public hospitals in the Southeast.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), headquartered in Atlanta since 1946, made Georgia the epicenter of America's public health infrastructure. The CDC grew from a small malaria control unit into the nation's premier disease surveillance agency. Morehouse School of Medicine, founded in 1975, became one of the nation's leading institutions for training minority physicians and addressing health disparities. The Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, where President Franklin D. Roosevelt sought treatment for polio in the 1920s and later established the 'Little White House,' drew national attention to rehabilitation medicine.

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About the Book

The book has a 4.5-star rating from over 1,000 readers on Amazon.

Supernatural Folklore and Ghost Traditions in Georgia

Georgia's supernatural folklore is rich with antebellum plantation ghosts, Civil War spirits, and Gullah-Geechee traditions from the coastal islands. The Sorrel-Weed House in Savannah, built in 1840, is considered one of the most haunted houses in America; the ghost of Molly, an enslaved woman who allegedly hanged herself after discovering an affair between her master and another enslaved woman, has been documented by numerous paranormal investigation teams. Savannah's Colonial Park Cemetery, where victims of the 1820 yellow fever epidemic were buried in mass graves, is said to be visited by spectral figures and mysterious orbs.

Beyond Savannah, the Chickamauga Battlefield near Chattanooga is haunted by 'Old Green Eyes,' a glowing apparition seen since the 1863 battle that killed nearly 35,000 soldiers. The town of St. Simons Island carries the legend of the haunting at the lighthouse, where the ghost of keeper Frederick Osborne, murdered by his assistant in 1880, still climbs the stairs. In the Okefenokee Swamp, legends of swamp hags and will-o'-the-wisps persist among local communities, rooted in both Creek Indian and African American folklore traditions.

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About the Book

He also wrote Clara's Magic Garden, a triple-award-winning children's book about a girl discovering her purpose.

Haunted Hospitals and Medical Landmarks in Georgia

Old South Georgia Medical Center Morgue (Valdosta): The old morgue and basement areas of this Valdosta hospital have long been a source of staff unease. Night shift workers have reported hearing gurney wheels rolling in empty corridors, cold spots near the old autopsy room, and the apparition of a doctor in outdated surgical attire who vanishes when addressed.

Old Candler Hospital (Savannah): Founded in 1804, Candler Hospital is the second-oldest continuously operating hospital in the United States. During yellow fever epidemics, bodies were stacked in the hospital's underground tunnels. The original building's basement, which served as a morgue and storage for the dead, is said to be one of Savannah's most haunted locations. Staff have reported seeing a spectral nurse, hearing moaning from the old tunnel system, and encountering cold spots in the original wing.

Types of Phenomena in the Book

Distribution across 26 physician accounts

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Research Finding

Progressive muscle relaxation reduces insomnia severity by 45% and decreases the time to fall asleep.

How This Book Can Help You

Georgia, home to the CDC and some of the Southeast's most important medical institutions, is a state where public health science and deeply rooted spiritual traditions coexist in dynamic tension. Physicians' Untold Stories would find a receptive audience among Georgia's medical community at Emory, Grady Memorial, and Morehouse School of Medicine, where physicians encounter the full spectrum of human suffering and resilience. Dr. Kolbaba's accounts of unexplained phenomena at the bedside take on particular meaning in a state where the CDC's evidence-based mission operates alongside the profound faith traditions of Georgia's communities—where physicians trained in scientific rigor frequently encounter patients and families whose spiritual convictions shape their experience of illness and healing.

Reading groups at churches near Commons, Roswell, Georgia will find this book sparks conversations that bridge the gap between Sunday morning faith and Monday morning medicine. The physicians' accounts validate what many churchgoers have always believed—that God is active in hospital rooms—while the clinical framing gives that belief a vocabulary that physicians can engage with.

Physicians' Untold Stories book cover — by Dr. Scott J. Kolbaba, MD
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Research Finding

Exposure to blue light in the morning improves alertness and mood — but blue light at night disrupts melatonin production.

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Discover the Stories Medicine Never Says Out Loud

Physicians' Untold Stories by Scott J. Kolbaba, MD4.5 stars from 1018 readers.

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Physicians' Untold Stories by Dr. Scott Kolbaba

Amazon Bestseller

The Stories Medicine Never Told You

Over 200 physicians interviewed. 26 true stories of ghost encounters, near-death experiences, and miraculous recoveries that will change the way you think about life, death, and what lies beyond.

By Dr. Scott J. Kolbaba, MD — 4.5★ from 1,018 ratings on Goodreads