In “Before Narrative: Episodic Reading and Representations of Chronic Pain,” an article in our June special issue on “Pain and its Paradoxes”, Sara Wasson counterpoises fragmentary, incomplete and episodic forms of writing to teleogenetic narratives that make the experience of chronic pain coherent and, in doing so, risk marginalising the voices of those whose experience does […]
Latest articles
June Special Issues: Pain and its Paradoxes
We are pleased to announce the June Special Issue of BMJ Medical Humanities on “Pain and its Paradoxes,” guest edited by Daniel Goldberg, PhD, Faculty at the Center for Bioethics and Humanities, University of Colorado. This incredibly diverse issue looks carefully at the concept of pain cross-culturally and from a variety of disciplinary lenses. MH […]
‘Your Love Protects Me’: The Pleasures and Perils of Caregiving
América, directed by Erick Stoll and Chase Whiteside, USA 2018 Showing on Saturday and Sunday 9th and 10th June at Sheffield Doc Fest, Review by Professor Robert Abrams, Professor of Old Age Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York Toward the end of the arresting film, América, a tour de force that depicts nearly […]
Wings
Today’s guest blog post comes from Rebecca Marshall who has just graduated from UCL Medical School having intercalated in Global Health. She is currently undertaking an MSc in Medical Anthropology (also at UCL). Her main interests include the intersections between medical anthropology, global health and bioethics. Here she writes about Wings, a recent play showing a […]
Book Review: Disability and the Welfare State in Britain
Jameel Hampton, Disability and the Welfare State in Britain: Changes in Perception and Policy, 1948-1979 (Bristol: Policy Press, 2016), 277 pp., $ 110.00 cloth, ISBN: 9781447316428. Reviewed by Sasha Mullally, University of New Brunswick From 1948 to 1979, British society might have been on a ‘collective train’ into an egalitarian social democratic future, but, as […]
Eat, Drink, Be NOT Merry and Die Too: Public Health Implications of Alcohol Consumption
In this blog post, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar and his colleagues discuss the public health implications of excessive alcohol consumption on the people of Kerala, India. Alcoholism has a major share in the morbidity profile of the Kerala society; apart from serious emotional, familial and economic crises, it also leads to higher rates of suicides. This is […]
White Coats Need Color
This week’s blog post comes from Caroline Christianson, a second year medical student at the Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, PA. ‘Write down something about yourself that has to be put on hold while you train in medicine.’ During what had so far been a passive group exercise, this prompt […]
100 Days of Medical Humanities Helping Health
Today’s guest blog post comes from Professor Marion Lynch, Deputy Medical Director of NHS England, Visiting Professor University of West London Dementia Care and Trustee of Paintings in Hospitals. Prof Lynch is spearheading 100 days of Medical Humanities helping health, 100 days of tweets up to 5th July 2018 to celebrate the UK National Health […]
In the Mood for a Melody
Today’s blog post comes from Shoshana B Weiner who is a fourth year medical student at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, and will be entering a pediatrics residency at NYP Weill-Cornell in June. I had just finished STEP-1, the infamous 8-hour medical board exam, and my brain was foggy. With months of prep suddenly coming […]
Conference Report: Empathy and Affect in Medical and Theatrical Practice
Empathy and Affect in Medical and Theatrical Practice: A Workshop, University of Warwick, 13th and 14th October 2017 Conference report by Stefania Crowther and Vivan Joseph This two-day interdisciplinary workshop at the University of Warwick, funded by the Monash-Warwick Alliance, brought together theatre practitioners, clinicians, scholars in medical humanities and creative artists to explore the […]