Student Artwork

Art Component Rationale

For the third workshop, students will be asked to reflect on their time spent with patient teachers and during their surgical clerkship by developing a creative reflection piece that can take the form of any media. Artistic reflection can have many benefits to the study and practice of surgery and medicine, and can also be personally rewarding. Combining the methods of the arts with surgical and medical education can provide a form of empathy training that allows students to understand patients’ perspectives,1 which will be shared by patient teachers during the first two workshops. Engaging with the arts has other powerful outcomes such as increased diagnostic observational skills,2 improved ability to pay attention to details in patients’ stories, and reduced assumptions about patients’ feelings and motivations.3

 

Selected References and Further Reading

  1. Perry M, Maffulli N, Willson S, Morrissey D. 2011. The Effectiveness of Arts-Based Intervention in Medical Education: A Literature Review. Medical Education, 45: 141-148.
  2. Shapiro J, Rucker L, Beck J. 2006. Training the Clinical Eye and Mind: Using the Arts to Develop Medical Students’ Observational and Pattern Recognition Skills. Medical Education, 2006, 40: 263-268.
  3. Lancaster T, Hart R, Gardner S. 2002. Literature and Medicine: Evaluating a Special Study Module Using the Nominal Group Technique. Medical Education, 36: 1071-1076.

Student Reflection Piece

Students are asked to produce a reflection piece that will form the starting point for group discussion during the last workshop. The piece can take on any form and be composed in any media from poetry or drawing to song or photography. Students have creative freedom to create a piece that conveys what they will take away from their experience interacting with patient teachers, or something that stood out to them or changed what they believed before participating in the program. Explore some examples of student reflective art here.

 

Artistic Reflection in Surgical and Medical Education 

Although it can seem daunting to be asked to produce something creative from scratch, artistic reflection can have many benefits to the study and practice of surgery and medicine,1 and can also be personally rewarding. During the first two workshops, students will be listening to patients’ complex and deeply personal stories of living with illness. Reflecting with arts-based approaches is an invitation to imagine from patients’ perspectives and attempt to communicate complexity in ways that others may be able to understand.

Perhaps the most powerful outcome of integrating arts-based approaches in medical education is empathy training. Working with the arts in combination with clinical education can increase students’ empathetic behaviours, the ability to resonate with and understand someone else’s perspective. 1, 2 The methods of the arts such as close-noticing/looking, critical inquiry, and interrogating one’s own assumptions are transferrable to the clinical setting. Exposure to the arts can improve students’ diagnostic observational skills,3 improve ability to pay close attention to details in patients’ stories, and reduce their own assumptions about patients’ feelings and motivations.4

Our request of students is actually quite simple: tell/show/write us a story. It may require being vulnerable for a moment to do something new, or maybe something you have not done in a while. As medical students and future medical professionals, you are entrusted with patients’ stories. This is your opportunity to experience what it feels like to tell one.

 

Selected References and Further Reading

  1. Perry M, Maffulli N, Willson S, Morrissey D. 2011. The Effectiveness of Arts-Based Intervention in Medical Education: A Literature Review. Medical Education, 45: 141-148.
  2. Zazulak J, Sanaee M, Frolic A, et al. 2017. The Art of Medicine: Arts-Based Training in Observation and Mindfulness for Fostering the Empathic Response in Medical Residents. Medical Humanities, 43: 192-198.
  3. Shapiro J, Rucker L, Beck J. 2006. Training the Clinical Eye and Mind: Using the Arts to Develop Medical Students’ Observational and Pattern Recognition Skills. Medical Education, 2006, 40: 263-268.
  4. Lancaster T, Hart R, Gardner S. 2002. Literature and Medicine: Evaluating a Special Study Module Using the Nominal Group Technique. Medical Education, 36: 1071-1076.