The story of the most commonly performed surgery, and what goes wrong with it – terribly wrong – 100,000 times a year in the United States. We’re excited to bring you the first episode of The Retrievals, Season 2, the new show from longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton. It’s from Serial Productions and The New York Times.
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Erik Tanner
Note: The internet version of this episode contains un-beeped curse words. BEEPED VERSION.
Prologue
Ira Glass introduces the first episode of an inventive new podcast from longtime This American Life producer and editor Susan Burton.
Act One
Susan Burton introduces Mindy, a labor and delivery nurse at UI Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago. (5 minutes)
Act Two
Another labor and delivery nurse at UI Health, Clara, gets ready to deliver twins at her own hospital and receives an epidural. (19 minutes)
Act Three
Clara’s anesthesia is not working. She is now in the middle of major abdominal surgery, and she can feel that surgery. (21 minutes)
Act Four
Heather, the head of obstetric anesthesia at UI Health, gets up onstage and asks a ballroom full of hundreds of anesthesiologists to wrestle with the question of why patients are feeling pain during C-sections, and what they can do to solve it. (8 minutes)
Follow The Retrievals: Season 2 wherever you get your podcasts to listen to the full season. You can also hear The Retrievals: Season 1, which tells the story of dozens of women seeking to become mothers who came to a fertility clinic at Yale, and the shocking events that unfolded there.
Related
Act Two: Distant Replay
Act Two: Sunrise, Sun-Get
Act Two: America, The Ad Campaign
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