Lived Scans: Integrating the Arts in Medical Education

My research project is motivated by the desire to understand how the sense of self is altered by biomedical imagining technologies, and what role the arts can play to remedy the schism between medical scans and the lived experiences of an ill patient. From my previous ethnographic research, I have come to believe that medical practitioners are mutually implicated in preservation of subjectivity for their patients. In order for doctors to view their patients as irreducible subjects instead of objects of study, empathy must be instilled, fostered, and preserved as a key component to patient. One proven strategy for empathy creation for students and professionals is the thoughtful integration of humanities into medical pedagogy. The UK has an established history of integrating the arts into medical education, a field known as the Medical Humanities. Through interviews with world-renowned Medical Humanists, conducting fine arts workshops for mixed classes of patients and physicians, and inserting myself into the critical discourse only found within esteemed Medical Humanities research clusters, I expect to decipher the strategies and best practices for integrating the arts into medicine. My ultimate goal is to create arts implementation procedures for the burgeoning Medical Humanities programs back in North America.

Faculty Supervisor:

Kim Sawchuk

Student:

Partner:

University of Kent

Discipline:

Sociology

Sector:

Education

University:

Concordia University

Program: