From Beth Epey Hashemi, youngest daughter of Kenneth Epey Lane:

Your Grandfather Lane was born on 7th March 1906 in Chartham - a small town in Kent (pronounced Char tam). His father (my grandfather) was Head Master of the school there. (I think it went up to age 16 but I am not sure). He retired in 1929 and I have the silver tea set with the inscription on the teapot - his retirement gift from the community. Ken's mother died of tuberculosis when he was 8. He spent the last 3 years of her life living in Margate with her in the house of two maiden aunts. The sea air was supposed to help TB patients! He himself caught TB, but luckily only in a gland in his neck. Because of this he was then immune to Tuberculosis so the army sent him - in 1945 just after the end of the war - to the very north of Norway to help with the Russian soldiers imprisoned by the Germans. They had TB and were starving. It was grim. It took me a long time to realize that this affected his behaviour when he came home after, I believe, 3 months up there. I did not like him at all and wished he would go away again…

Diary of a Medical Nobody: In the summer of 1929, Kenneth Lane joins a medical practice in a coal-mining town in Somerset, England. This is his first-hand account of the years he spent as a general practitioner of medicine before the discovery of antibiotics in the decade leading up to the Second World War. Each chapter is the story of a patient and a family, describing how they dealt with an illness or a tragedy, and how Dr. Lane navigated the difficulties of diagnosis, the seriousness of the decisions he had to make, and his relationship with the patient and family. The stories are told with particular attention to the role that human happiness and temperament might play in the prevalence and persistence of illness. (Ebook)

West Country Doctor: "The year was 1938 and I believed at the time that it must be the heyday, the golden age of our lives.” So begins this second installment in the autobiography of Dr. Kenneth Lane, general practitioner of medicine in Somerset, England. But the golden age has not yet begun: Dr. Lane must leave his family and his practice behind to serve as a doctor in the British Army. He serves in Africa, Italy, France, and Norway. He spends a total of five years away from home. After the war, his rural practice resumes and he becomes an enthusiastic, if over-worked, member of Britain's newly-formed National Health Service. (Ebook)

The Longest Art: Dr. Kenneth Lane began as a general practitioner of medicine in rural Somerset, England in the 1930s. He served in the Second World War in Africa, Italy, France, and Norway. He was an enthusiastic participant in the National Health Service when it was established after the war. In his autobiographical books, Diary of a Medical Nobody and West Country Doctor, Dr. Lane presents to the layman the day-to-day challenges and rewards of general practice. But the Longest Art is written for medical professionals. It is a guide for the aspiring general practitioner. The focus of the book is not the exact diagnosis of specific maladies and the application of their cures, but the manner in which the doctor must understand and work with his or her patients in order to make an accurate diagnosis possible, and to subsequently administer a successful cure. The book deals with a variety of social issues that can confound a general practitioner, such as malingerers, hypochondriacs, patients who will not speak plainly, and families who are in conflict with one another and their doctor. In every chapter of the book we see Dr. Lane's dedication to the relationship between patient and doctor as a foundation for the provision of good care. (Ebook)