Let’s face it: medical training left you with zero time to read anything that wasn’t for learning your specialty and passing licensing and board exams. Now that you’re out of the training trenches, you might crave books that don’t just regurgitate pathophysiology but spark curiosity about medicine’s past, present, and (AI-fueled) future. Whether you’re itching to understand where healthcare’s headed, marvel at its history, or just need a literary escape, these five books (in no order) will keep your stethoscope on the pulse of medicine in 2025.

• Outlive by Peter Attia
  Buckle up for a wild ride through medicine’s past and future with Attia, a physician who’s all-in on catching disease before it crashes the party. His obsession with early detection via every diagnostic tool short of a crystal ball might raise your eyebrows, but his historical take and vision for prevention over chronic disease firefighting will hit you like a well-timed consult. You’ll rethink your practice, your patients’ care, and maybe even your own health—because who has time for a checkup? Check out my radiologist’s take on The Radiology Review Insider.

• The Emperor of All Maladies by Siddhartha Mukherjee
  This isn’t just a history of cancer—it’s a medical epic that’ll have you cheering for unsung heroes like Farber while gasping at how their peers roasted them for daring to think big. Mukherjee’s storytelling weaves a tale of discovery, dogged persistence, and cancer’s infuriating knack for dodging our best shots. It’s a masterclass in thinking outside the box (or petri dish) and a reminder that innovation often comes with a side of ridicule. Long? Yes. Worth it? Absolutely. Bonus: it inspired a PBS series, so you can count on its quality and broad appeal.

• Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson
  Surprise! This isn’t a medical book, but it’s a goldmine for physicians fed up with bureaucracy. It ventures into the National Institutes of Health’s history—and how its founders warned against the grant-writing nightmares we now endure—it will make you want to scream, “But that is exactly what happened!” As someone who’s written several NIH R01s (and was left astounded at the process), I found this cathartic and eye-opening. It’s a witty, infuriating look at how red tape stifles innovation, with important lessons for building a less maddening healthcare and research system.

• Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande

• For the practice of medicine in 2025, Atul Gawande’s most important book is likely Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End. This book is especially relevant today as healthcare increasingly emphasizes value-based care, patient-centered decision-making, and early integration of palliative care. With aging populations growing rapidly worldwide, Gawande’s insights on geriatric care, quality of life, and end-of-life decisions are more urgent than ever. The book also provides valuable guidance on having difficult but essential conversations with patients and their families—skills that technology such as AI and protocols cannot replace. Additionally, Being Mortal connects personal stories to larger systemic healthcare challenges, making it valuable not only for clinicians but also for healthcare leaders. While other books by Gawande, such as The Checklist Manifesto and Better, offer important lessons on clinical safety and healthcare improvement, Being Mortal stands out in 2025 for its focus on rethinking and improving end of life care.

• ChatGPT, MD by Robert Pearl
  AI’s the shiny new scalpel in medicine, and ChatGPT, MD (2024) is the sharpest healthcare AI read for physicians in 2025. Co-authored with GPT-4, it dives into large language models’ potential to revolutionize diagnostics, documentation, and patient empowerment while tackling corporate healthcare’s stranglehold. It’s practical, timely, and a bit optimistic (maybe too much—AI won’t fix your EMR’s clunkiness overnight), but its real-world applications resonate. Compared to Future Care by Jag Singh (great for sensor nerds in cardiology) or Deep Medicine by Eric Topol (inspiring but stuck in 2019), Pearl’s book wins for its focus on LLMs and systemic reform. My radiologist take? LLMs are already outshining radiology-specific diagnostics for impact—see The Radiology Review Insider.

These books are a shot of inspiration and perspective to make you a sharper, more empathetic physician. So, swap your EMR screen for a good read—you might just find the spark to survive another call shift. Happy reading!

These five books are just a starting point to spark curiosity, inspire thoughtful practice, and reconnect you with the human side of medicine. If you’re hungry for even more reading that spans medical history, systems thinking, patient stories, and the cutting edge of healthcare, check out additional recommendations here: Top Medical Books – General Interest. Your next great read—and a fresh perspective on medicine—might be waiting just a click away.