Leggo; dies from leukemia. Anna O., a 'gomere' who cries, "ROODLE ROODLE". George Donowitz, a private patient. Ina Goober, a former New Masada resident who cries, "Go avay". Mr. Itzak Rokitansky, a former college professor who had suffered a stroke; visited daily by his sisters, he cries "PURRTY GUD". Rose Katz, a LOL in NAD. Other Berry, Roy's girlfriend. Levy, a BMS student. Laws of the House of God The Fat Man's laws Roy Basch's further laws Context and impact The book takes place during the Watergate scandal, and follows such events as the resignation of Spiro T. Agnew and Richard Nixon. A 2019 short essay by Shem and an accompanying online documentary document the origins of the book and the characters upon which it is based. The story is autobiographical, as the BMS is a thinly veiled Harvard Medical School (commonly called HMS), and The House of God represents the Beth Israel Hospital, now a part of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, one of the HMS-affiliated hospitals in Boston, Massachusetts; "Man's Best Hospital" (MBH) represents Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). According to the author, many older physicians were offended by the work. Many of the terms defined in the book (see glossary) have since become widely known and used in medical culture. It has been argued that The House of God was revolutionary in that it brought to light paradoxical issues of care in modern medicine. Patients (in the book under Putzel) who were not acutely ill could nevertheless be admitted to the hospital and undergo multiple invasive procedures, creating a revenue stream for the hospital but exposing the patient to risk and discomfort, and demoralizing the residents. Reimbursement rules have been changed to prohibit this practice under value-based purchasing (see Pay for performance (healthcare)). JAMA (the Journal of the American Medical Association) has a distinct collection of hundreds of articles titled "Less Is More" that discuss multiple areas of medicine where standard interventions seem to hurt patients. The Fat Man's last law, "The delivery of good medical care is to do as much nothing as possible," is supported. Others propose that the book was the impetus for limiting medical resident work hours. Glossary Nouns Gomer: An acronym meaning "get out of my emergency room". The acronym is used to refer to a patient who is frequently admitted to the hospital with complicated but uninspiring and incurable conditions. LOL in