From the Publisher

By Louis A. Weil III

Not even the best-staged TV-doctor series can convey the emotional intensity, the gruesome tableaux and the technical wizardry of a hospital emergency room. To capture the horror and heroics for this week's cover, we dispatched photographers to seven hospitals in seven cities. Their assignment: to stake out some of the country's busiest emergency rooms and record the minute-by- minute drama on film.

At Highland General Hospital in Oakland, Chuck Nacke found a horrific scene. Both trauma rooms were full for several hours. One doctor, soaked with sweat, massaged the hearts of two patients and later almost climbed onto the chest of a third in an attempt to restart his heartbeat. In the parking area outside, a car pulled up, a door opened and an inert body was dropped off. As the car drove away, nurses hurriedly wheeled the abandoned person inside, where he was treated. Staff members, says Nacke, are "stretched to the limit 24 hours a day."

In spite of crisis and chaos in the emergency rooms, the photographers had only praise for the doctors and nurses working there. "They are incredibly cool and professional," says Kenneth Jarecke, who took his cameras to the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center at University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore.

After three nights at Boston City Hospital, Steve Liss was surprised at "the way they work at top speed while chatting lightly and irreverently. You have to think of M*A*S*H." Mark Richards hopped into Los Angeles County Fire Department trucks with correspondent James Willwerth to accompany a paramedic team around Los Angeles County. Says Richards: "These guys see more of life on one shift than I ever imagined."

The cover story was written by associate editor Nancy Gibbs, who decided to take a closeup look herself. Gibbs visited E.R.s in New York City and Washington, where she followed Dr. Michael Bourland and his staff through a grueling tour of duty at George Washington University Medical Center. "I can't imagine a tougher job than working in an emergency room," she says. "The pressure is relentless; the stakes are life itself."