This is Fresh Air. I'm Dave Davies, and today for Terry Gross. Our guest today, Jay

Wellens, is used to operating on tiny brains. Not just brains, but all parts of kids' central

nervous systems, including the spine of a fetus, he described as being the size of three

grains of rice stacked together. As a pediatric neurosurgeon, Wellens uses amazing advances

in medicine to heal and repair children's suffering from illnesses and injuries, some

caused by car accidents, sports collisions, and increasingly gunshot wounds. But in practically

every case, he's also dealing with parents confronting their worst fear, the prospect

of losing a child. Wellens writes that he's cried with parents from relief and sometimes

from sadness and sometimes in a locker room when no one else was there.

Dr. Jay Wellens is a professor of neurological surgery at the Monroe, Carell, Jr. Children's

Hospital at Vanderbilt and the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He's also medical director

of the surgical outcomes center for kids, which he co-founded, and he's written op-ed pieces

for the New York Times. He reflects on his experiences in a new memoir titled, All That

Moves Us, a pediatric neurosurgeon, his young patients, and their stories of grace and

resilience. Well, Jay Wellens, welcome to Fresh Air.

Thank you, Dave. The book is told mostly through cases. You take a chapter and tell us

a story. And I wanted to begin with one. This is, well, while back, you were practicing

in Birmingham, Alabama. You get a call from an emergency room physician in, I think,

Auburn, which is about 100 miles away. He has a nine-year-old girl who was injured in

an auto accident. What does he tell you? Well, it's unbelievably bad weather. And, you

know, most tertiary medical centers have helicopters that fly back and forth, bringing people

in who need to be seen urgently or emergency. And, you know, I get this call one Saturday

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