Book Club Collection: 'The Good Nurse' by Charles Graeber

The Good Nurse: A True Story of Medicine, Madness, and Murder by Charles Graeber tells about the investigation and conviction of Charlie Cullen, a nurse who killed patients. The killings occurred at random in the hospitals where he worked over his sixteen year career. It is a frightening tale that might not have ended in a conviction if one woman had not come forward and helped the police end the killing spree. The Good Nurse is a story of caution about the medical field that will frighten most readers.

Charlie Cullen had a difficult childhood. He was one of eight children. He was born so late in his parents' lives that his father died a short time before his birth. Charlie was close to his mother, but he was often tortured by his older sisters and their boyfriends. Charlie fell into a depression when his mother died after a car accident. He entered the Navy to give his life some purpose. He despised the Navy.

After Charlie's return to civilian life, he enrolled as the only man in nursing school. While working his way through school, he met and fell in love with Adrianne. Charlie and Adrianne married. He began his first job almost immediately. They had a daughter within a year, but Adrianne began to notice that Charlie acted oddly around the baby and their dog. Adrianne began to notice other odd things as the years passed, including abuse of the dogs and Charlie’s heavy drinking, even around the children. Adrianne eventually filed for divorce, claiming Charlie was abusive. Charlie lost custody of his two daughters.

Charlie moved from job to job. He would do well on a job for awhile. Then, odd behavior would cause him to come under scrutiny. Charlie's first job was at St. Barnabas Hospital where he was suspected of spiking IV bags with insulin. Next, Charlie moved on to Warren Hospital. He was eventually let go from that hospital for suspicion of causing the death of a patient. A short time before he had been arrested and charged with breaking into a co-worker’s house.

From Warren, Charlie went to Morristown. While there, Charlie was accused of not caring for his patients properly and leaving their rooms messy. Charlie tried to commit suicide for a second time and ended up spending time at Greystone Psychiatric Hospital again.

Charlie started working at a nursing home called Liberty. At Liberty, Charlie appeared to be involved in the suspicious deaths of two men. After one of the deaths, another nurse was fired. In her lawsuit against Liberty, she named Charlie as the suspect. Charlie left Liberty and got a job at Lehigh Valley Hospital. At Lehigh, Charlie was involved in several deaths, including that of a young burn patient. After another failed suicide attempt, Charlie was let go from Lehigh Valley Hospital. From Lehigh, Charlie moved to Saint Luke’s, where he was eventually accused of throwing away perfectly good medication and stealing others.

Charlie worked at Somerset Medical Center for more than a year. During his time there, he met Amy Loughren. Amy and Charlie became good friends. Amy was unaware that Charlie was killing patients with overdoses of medication, often a cocktail of medicines. Charlie had to be tricky about the way he got the drugs because the hospital used a system called Pyxis to control the drugs being used. Charlie was nearly caught once when the hospital became concerned about the death of Reverend Gall, but the investigation stalled.

A pharmacy employee at Somerset called the Center for Poison Control during the investigation into Gall’s death. The head of the Center for Poison Control warned Somerset that they should involve the police, but they did not. Instead, they informed the Department of Health who failed to act. The police were not brought in on the case until five months later.

Tim Braun and Danny Baldwin were relentless in their investigation of Charlie. However, they did not understand much of the information presented to them because it was medical in nature. However, Amy realized with just a look at Charlie’s Pyxis records that he was doing something wrong. She agreed to help the police. Amy made several calls to Charlie that were recorded. The police eventually got enough information to arrest Charlie; and, he confessed.

Charlie was convicted of thirteen murders in the hospitals where he worked. For three years, he helped police look through medical records to identify other victims. Charlie was sentenced to life in prison. At one point, however, Charlie did something to save a human life. He donated a kidney to the brother of his former girlfriend.
(Summary provided by BookRags.com)

CHARLES GRAEBER is an award-winning journalist, a New York Times bestselling author He is also  freelance anything interesting, and thus serves as a futurist advisor and consultant for medical, technological, gaming and creative projects, as an executive producer for documentary and scripted films, and is a frequent media guest and keynote speaker at professional conferences and fundraisers. 

His work has appeared in publications including The New Yorker, Elk, New York Magazine, GQ, Outside, Bloomberg Business week, The New York Times, National Geographic Adventure, American Cowboy, Vogue, Men's Journal, Details, The Cambodia Daily, The Phnom Penh Post, The Budapest Sun, The Guardian, The Nantucket Beacon, Boston Magazine, Kidney International, MIT Technology Review,  NASCAR Magazine and Wired, for which is a Contributing Editor.  

His work has been  honored with An Overseas Press Club award for Outstanding International Journalism, a New York Press Club prize, an American Poet's Prize (2nd), and  several National Magazine Award nominations for feature writing, and anthologized in collections including The Best American Crime Writing, The Best American Science Writing, The Best of Technology Writing, The Best American Business Writing, Flights of Imagination: Extraordinary Writing About Birds, The Best of 10 Years of National Geographic Adventure, The Best of 20 years of Wired, and The Best American Magazine Writing , as selected by the American Society of Magazine Editors (ASME) and the Columbia University School of Journalism. He also won the Nantucket Sandcastle Competition with his father and untold bets pens and keys on his own. 

His book The Breakthrough; Immunotherapy and the Race to Cure Cancer  was supported by a fellowship by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and was shortlisted for the Medical Book of the Year by the  British Medical Association. The science it describes was subsequently awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology. His Edgar Award-nominated book The Good Nurse  was a Goodreads Choice "Nonfiction Book of the Year" nominee adapted into a Netflix feature film starring Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne.  Graeber still hopes that a fuller justice will be served for the victims of Charles Cullen and those who sheilded him.

He serves on boards including those of The Overseas Press Club of America and Building Markets, an international nonprofit dedicated to empowering refugees from war, poverty and persecution.  He also and mostly does other stuff.
(Biography provided by the author)