Narrative Medicine for Medical Learners, Duke University

This elective course is a fourth year clinical elective where students will discuss selected works of literature that address the human condition in a way that is meaningful to physicians-in-training. The course is open to third and fourth year medical students. The aim is to incorporate literature into the medical training experience, give students the opportunity to practice reflective writing, and the space to explore the humanistic roots of medicine. In this course we will examine the intersection between the domains of narrative and medicine through the study of diverse representations of medical issues. Among the questions we will ask are: how does narrative give us greater insight into illness, medical treatment, doctor-patient relationships, and other aspects of health and medicine? How do illness and other experiences within the realm of medicine influence ways of telling stories? How do doctors’ perspectives and patients’ perspectives differ, and what, if anything, should be done to close those differences? This course is elective, non-credit-bearing. This information has been collected for the Post-Discipline Online Syllabus Database. The database explores the use of literature by schools of professional education in North America. It forms part of a larger project titled Post-Discipline: Literature, Professionalism, and the Crisis of the Humanities, led by Dr Merve Emre with the assistance of Dr Hayley G. Toth. You can find more information about the project at https://postdiscipline.english.ox.ac.uk/. Data was collected and accurate in 2021/22.