Blog by Jessica Hammett, University of Bristol, jessica.hammett@bristol.ac.uk What’s the relationship between the humanities and public health—rather than medicine? Public health typically focuses on populations rather than individuals, and on the prevention of illness and promotion of health and wellbeing. Sometimes seen as a ‘poor relation’ to biomedicine, it has enjoyed new prominence and recognition […]
Category: Blog
Invisible Disabilities Should Not Mean Invisible Patients
Blog by Rebecca Zickerman When doctors fail to communicate effectively with their patients, quality of care is impacted; on the patient side, communication barriers such as language, health literacy, and disabilities interfering with information processing may all contribute to detrimental health effects. Health-care providers need more training on how to communicate effectively with patients […]
Acting My Age
Blog by Tina Chai When asked my age, I almost always want to say sixteen before stopping myself to say twenty-four. I don’t feel twenty-four. At most, I’m twenty-three and three-fourths—oscillating between who I was and who I want to become, but not feeling quite there or quite good enough. Sometimes, I say something […]
Does Disgust Protect Us from Pathogens?
Blog by Philippa Nicole Barr We have all heard the provocative discussions about turning protein-rich insects into a viable, global food source for humans and animals.1 Yet the idea of eating them generates disgust or approval, depending on where in the world they are being served. What does this variable response imply for theories that […]
An Orisha in Bristol: Henrietta Lacks and Mojisola Adebayo’s Family Tree
Blog by Taylor Riley Bristol, UK is a monument to the intertwining of histories of slavery and medicine. Smaller, literal monuments around the city tell its stories. There is the plinth that once held the statue of slave trader Edward Colston, which Black Lives Matter protestors toppled and drowned in the harbor in 2020. The […]
They Are Not All Wolves: Menstruation, Young Adult Fiction and Nuancing the Teenage Boy
Article Summary by Jemma Walton Literary depictions of menstruation are scarce, despite the fierce interest which accompanied the 1970 publication of Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret; a Young Adult novel that ends with the young female protagonist thanking God for the arrival of her first period. However, an intensification in menstrual activism across […]
Turning Good Intentions into Good Outcomes: Ethical Dilemmas at a Student-Run Clinic and a Rubric for Reflective Action
Blog by Nicholas Peoples, Thomas Gebert and Dana L Clark Student-run clinics represent a unique medical education and healthcare delivery model powered largely by good intentions. These good intentions may produce questionable results, however, when juxtaposed with intense academic pressure for students to fill their curriculum vitae with personal achievements, leadership roles, and peer-reviewed publications. […]
Imagining New Humanities-Based Interventions to Address Caregiver Burden in Chronic Illness
Blog by Rita Dexter, MA As more and more medical schools incorporate medical humanities courses into their curriculum, their long-lasting impacts on the perspectives of our future physicians appear tangible.1 While we certainly need more empathetic and thoughtful physicians, medical humanities has the capacity to extend its reach beyond medical school education to help the […]
The Doctor Will Not See You Now
Blog by Drew Remignanti, MD, MPH “The boundaries between health and disease, between well and sick, are far from clear and never will be clear, for they are diffused by cultural, social, and psychological considerations.” So wrote Dr. George L. Engel in 1977, when he proposed his biopsychosocial model of illness. The bolding of never […]
The Story Behind Kaleidoscopic Minds: An Anthology of Poetry by Neurodivergent Women
Blog by Dr. Catherine Bell, GP and coeditor of Kaleidoscopic Minds Kaleidoscopic Minds is an anthology of poetry written by neurodivergent women. The poets featured in this collection belong to a generation of late-diagnosed, undiagnosed and misdiagnosed women with lived experience of ADHD, autism, dyslexia, dyspraxia, OCD, and tics. The editors believe that poetry is […]