From the Division of Medical Humanities at NYU Langone Health and the Gold Foundation

Bearing Witness: Storytelling by Healthcare Professionals and Learners During Times of Uncertainty

"In a time of devastating illness, social upheaval, and economic ruin, we invited the academic medicine community to tell their stories," write Lisa Howley, PhD, Virginia Bush, and Elizabeth Gaufberg, MD, MPH. The authors describe the FRAHME (the Fundamental Role of the Arts and Humanities in Medical Education) initiative's online collection of stories from the healthcare community, capturing the past several years' unique place in history.

Continue reading in Reflective MedEd

Narrative medicine, narrative practice, and the creation of meaning

Bringing together the perspectives of a medical educator and literary scholar, John Launer and Anita Wohlmann explore the "spectrum of activities that nowadays fly under the banner of narrative medicine." They highlight the differences and commonalities between academic narrative medicine and narrative practice in the field, and how these approaches can complement each other.

Continue reading in The Lancet

Building a better brain through music, dance and poetry

It is widely accepted that art — whether it be storytelling, painting, dance, or music — creates connections among people. But can it also create new connections in the brain, helping us better learn and adapt?

Continue reading on NPR

How George Bernard Shaw brought the drama of healthcare to the stage

Medical historian Dr. Howard Markel highlights Shaw's play The Doctor's Dilemma, and the moral question at its center: "How does one quantify the value of another person’s life and who is even qualified to do so fairly and justly?"

Continue reading on PBS NewsHour



NYU Langone LitMed Database: Hunger Pains: Andrew Mangham, PhD, on Medicine & Starvation in Victorian Literature 

In this interview, NYU LitMed co-editor Sebastian C. Galbo talks with Andrew Mangham, PhD, about the research behind his book The Science of Starving in Victorian Literature, Medicine, and Political Economy. 

Continue reading

Gold Connection Podcast: On Writing "The Light" with Mason Blacker

This episode is part of a series of conversations with winners of the Gold Foundation’s Hope Babette Tang Humanism in Healthcare Essay Contest. Mason Blacker, a student at NYU Grossman School of Medicine who won first place for medical students in the 2022 contest, reads his winning essay, “The Light,” and discusses his writing process.

Continue reading

Quick Links:

• Health Humanities: A Baseline Survey of Baccalaureate and Graduate Programs in North America
• The language of vaccination campaigns during COVID-19
• Zines from the in-between
• Artists Consider the Concept of Care
• Corresponding about Death: Analyzing Letters Exchanged between Patients with Cancer and Medical Students

• Pearl Birnbaum Hurwitz Humanism in Healthcare Award, nomination period opens the week of April 24
• Gold Humanism Scholars at the Harvard Macy Institute Program for Educators, application deadline 5/15/23
• Call for Stories on "Taking Care," for a live storytelling event presented by The Nocturnists & Bellevue Literary Review, deadline 5/15/23
• Writing Medicine: A Wellness Intervention for Healthcare Workers (Research Study, no deadline noted)
• The Nocturnists: Post-Roe America (call for audio stories, no deadline noted)

April 21- 23

The Art and Science of Narrative Medicine: Creativity, Community, Justice, Care (in-person, New York, NY)

April 22

Rebirth: An evening of medical storytelling (in-person, Minneapolis, MN)

April 26

The Dr. Paul Kalanithi Writing Award Reading (online)

April 27

Figure Drawing Workshop for Healthcare Professionals (in-person, Davis, CA, part of the 2023 GHHS Well-being Workshop Series; additional session: May 8)

April 27-28

Narrative Medicine: Practice, Purpose, & Pedagogy (in-person, Duke University Trent Semans Center for Health Education, Durham, NC)

April 27 - May 3

ReelAbilities Film Festival, New York (hybrid)

May 3

Narrative Medicine Rounds with Cinque Northern: "The Real World Impact of Story" (online)

May 9

(Serious) Fun with the UnLonely Film Festival (online)

May 9

Connecting with and prescribing healing nature (hybrid, online & in-person, University of Florida, part of the 2023 GHHS Well-being Workshop Series)

May 19

Resistance: The Sixth Annual Northwestern Bioethics and Medical Humanities Conference (in-person, Chicago, IL)

May 23

Abraham Verghese on The Covenant of Water (in-person, Brooklyn, NY)

June 13

Grief Over Patient Loss: a collective debriefing through poetry and prose (online, part of the 2023 GHHS Well-being Workshop Series)

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