Abstract
Qualitative and quantitative research on the impact of medical and health humanities teaching in baccalaureate education is sparse. This paper reviews recent studies of the impact of medical and health humanities coursework in pre-health professions education and describes a pilot study of baccalaureate students who completed semester-long medical humanities courses in the Division of Medical Humanities & Bioethics at the University of Rochester. The study format was an email survey. All participants were current or former baccalaureate students who had taken one or more courses in literature and narrative in medicine, bioethics, history of medicine, and/or visual arts and healthcare during the past four years. The survey gathered numerical data in several areas: demographic information, career plans, self-reported influence of coursework on educational and career plans, and self-reported influence of coursework on intellectual skills and abilities. It also gathered narrative commentary that elaborated on students’ responses to the numerically-based questions. Notable findings from preliminary analysis of the data include higher scores of self-reported impact of the coursework on specific habits of mind and on preparedness for intended career rather than on gaining admission to future educational programs. Discussion of the results focuses on several potential future directions this type of study might take, including multi-center, longitudinal, and sequential approaches.
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Endnotes
1 For the purposes of this paper, “health humanities” describes humanities-focused teaching for learners in or preparing for diverse healthcare disciplines, including but not limited to medicine. “Medical humanities” describes humanities-focused teaching specifically for physicians in training and/or physicians. At the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, our curriculum is designated as medical humanities, which nomenclature we retain in this study.
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Baker, C.J., Shaw, M.H., Mooney, C.J. et al. The Medical Humanities Effect: a Pilot Study of Pre-Health Professions Students at the University of Rochester. J Med Humanit 38, 445–457 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-017-9446-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-017-9446-4