Tag: Empathy
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Scars
Morgan Alexander Dayton, Ohio, United States Taylor by Lauren Henschel. 2011. Part of the Indelible documentary series. “I see you’ve got some scars here,” the doctor said, gesturing to two faint, thin lines that ran down both sides of the patient’s neck. “What’s that about?” The patient in the room with us was covered in scars…
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Maintaining a moral compass in medicine
Jeffrey Lee Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States “The Doctor.” Painting by Sir Luke Fildes, 1891. Location: Tate Gallery, London Fildes the doctor It seemed like just another day during my third-year surgical rotation until I heard Mrs. W. cry. It was during daily rounds in the bustling ICU, and our team was squeezed around a single…
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Healing in post-genocide Rwanda
Vigneshwar Subramanian Nivetha Subramanian Cleveland, Ohio, United States The Apotheosis of War, Vasily Vereshchagin (1871) In April 1994, one of the largest genocides since the Holocaust erupted in Rwanda as the Hutu ethnic majority conducted a targeted slaughter of the Tutsi people.1 In a span of just over 100 days, over 800,000 people were killed.2…
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Provider empathy: a patient’s tale
Jacklyn Munn Arlington, Virginia, United States In the practice of medicine, empathy may be the greatest prescription of all. It can provide a patient with confidence, comfort, and the understanding that their healthcare provider knows them as an individual, not just a series of diagnoses and treatments. It creates an opportunity for providers to…
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Empathy for medical students
David Jeffrey Edinburgh, United Kingdom Medical students check blood glucose on a patient. On a windy corner of Drummond Street, not far from Rutherford’s pub in Edinburgh, there is a small bronze plaque with these words: “And when I remembered all that I hoped and feared as I pickled about Rutherford’s in the rain…
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Portrait of nursing
Lynda Slimmer Chicago, Illinois, United States Sunday Treat by Robert Hayes Using your mind’s eye, imagine a painting that my husband and I bought several years ago in the Smokey Mountains. An old-fashioned, wooden, crank-type ice cream maker rests in the foreground surrounded by heaps of fresh red strawberries and lava-like streams of thick,…
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Literature in medical school: why, how, and if
Tabitha Sparks Montreal, Canada Photography by studioapril1982 Do literature courses in medical school make better doctors? Will the doctors be more sensitive, display more empathy? If so, how is this achieved? And what is the evidence it does so? Since 1980 many educators have supported the integration of humanities coursework into medical school curricula.…
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Shadowing Artists on the Wards: an undergraduate, arts-based medical elective
Pamela Brett-MacLean Michelle Casavant Shirley Serviss Alyssa Cruz Edmonton, Canada Shirley Serviss, Artist on the Wards, 2011 Stephen Wreakes, Medical Photographer. University of Alberta Hospital, Alberta Health Services, Edmonton. Medicine is frequently described as both an art and science, with science focused on objective, technical knowledge (competency, or cure) and the artistic elements focused…