Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Fall 2009

  • Humanities at the heart of healthcare

    Victoria BonebakkerPortland, Maine, United States Imagine doctors, nurses, receptionists, trustees, administrators, lab techs and physician assistants, books in hand, sitting in a hospital conference room, cafeteria or lounge. With a humanities scholar serving as a facilitator, they are discussing the novel, short story or poem they have read, and reflecting together on what it means…

  • The brain is wider than the sky: integrating insights of neuroscience with Hatha Yoga

    Michael McCollyChicago, Illinois, United States The Brain — is wider than the Sky —For — put them side by side —The one the other will containWith ease — and You — beside —Emily Dickenson     The age of neuroscience has arrived. Go to a bookstore, turn on a TV, open a magazine, and you’ll…

  • Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be

    Liam FarrellCrossmaglen, Ireland The season of mists and mellow fruitfulness is upon us again. Like Garrison Keillor, my great sin is nostalgia (my lesser sins include lust, envy, and sloth; but they hardly count, every Tom, Dick, and Harry has them), and so autumn is my favorite time of year. I can stroll contentedly through…

  • Studying medicine

    Matko MarusicCroatia The author studied medicine from 1965 to 1970, at the Zagreb University School of Medicine, the capital city of Croatia, in the country that at that time was called Yugoslavia. It was under communist rule (until 1990). The home town of the author is Split, on the Adriatic coast, some 200 miles south…

  • The first experiment

    Filip ŠimunovićGermany Sebastijan’s first independent animal experiment at Harvard transpired in the manner of something Edgar Poe could have written—if he knew anything about animal experiments and stereotactic neurosurgery at his time. Sebastijan, however, wasn’t there to read about it, or to write about it. He was there to survive it. He started operating on…

  • To mount a camel

    Larry ZaroffStanford University, California For the West, Afghanistan is a country difficult to understand. Though largely Muslim, it is a society made up of multiple ethnic groups and classes, beset by ideological disagreements, with disconnected provinces that are unstable, unconquerable, and often anarchic. All Afghans are culturally mixed, yet are highly independent, believe strongly in…

  • Capturing recovery from trauma on canvas

    Eliette MarkhbeinNew York, United States Her biography I came to painting as a result of trauma. A journalist covering arts and culture for European and American magazines for 25 years, I suffered a traumatic brain and spine injury in 2004, the consequence of being struck by a speeding car. I picked up brushes a year…

  • Doctor Moore in Italy

    Einar Perman Stockholm, Sweden In a recent issue of Hektoen International, I wrote about Doctor John Moore’s travels in Europe.1 Moore, a practicing physician in Glasgow with a good reputation, was offered an opportunity to travel. Like other prominent noblemen of his day, the young Duke of Hamilton was to make the Grand Tour as a…

  • Selections from Redefining the Medical Artist

    Meena MalhotraChicago, Illinois, USA Redefining the Medical Artist is an exhibition of work by the students, faculty, and staff of the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Biomedical Visualization program. It was held at the International Museum of Surgical Science in Chicago from August 7th to October 16th, 2009. The works featured in this show…

  • Redefining the medical artist

    Meena MalhotraChicago, Illinois, USA Medical illustration is a long-standing tradition that dates back to the sixteenth-century anatomist and physician Andreas Vesalius. In his preface to his book, De humani corporis fabrica (On the Fabric of the Human Body), Vesalius commented on the value of images and dissection in learning anatomy: How much pictures aid the…