The mirac­u­lous tri­umphs of mod­ern med­i­cine — antibi­otics, insulin, can­cer cures, longer and bet­ter lives — are the fruits of a firm ground­ing in sci­ence. But too often, the heal­ing touch, the empa­thy of a physi­cian for the patient, the art of med­i­cine, can be neglect­ed in pur­suit of break­throughs. David Nathan nev­er accept­ed that bar­gain. A bril­liant hema­tol­o­gist thor­ough­ly steeped in sci­en­tif­ic rig­or with a research track record to prove it, Nathan was above all a human­ist, a car­ing physi­cian who nev­er failed to put the patient first even when that patient was his research sub­ject. This same human­ism, informed by his social­ly aware Jew­ish upbring­ing in bas­tions of WASPish New Eng­land, pro­pelled Nathan to the top ranks of aca­d­e­m­ic lead­er­ship, first at Boston Children’s Hos­pi­tal, then at Dana-Far­ber Can­cer Insti­tute where, as pres­i­dent, he res­cued a hos­pi­tal that was thought to be doomed after its doc­tors admin­is­tered a fatal chemother­a­py over­dose. This is the sto­ry of a physi­cian who left an indeli­ble imprint on med­i­cine through his relent­less focus on the patient.