Faculty Bibliography

On Tuesday evenings at New York University School of Medicine (NYUSoM), the anatomy lab is transformed into an art studio. Medical students gather with a spirit of creative enterprise and a unique goal: to turn anatomy into art. They are participants in Art & Anatomy, an innovative drawing course within the Master Scholars Program in Humanistic Medicine (MSPHM)-a component of NYUSoM, which offers elective courses across a range of interdisciplinary topics in medical humanities. Art & Anatomy has had approximately four hundred fifty participants since its inception in 2009. The educational intention of the course is to use drawing as an active mode of learning that enhances visual-perceptual ability and three-dimensional (3D) spatial understanding of the body's interior; however, the course also opens a creative space for participants to process the emotional complexities of cadaver dissection and the anatomy lab experience. The anatomy lab can be the training ground for clinical detachment, but many U.S. medical schools are beginning to attend more closely to the emotional aspects of dissection. The authors maintain that the inherently expressive nature of drawing makes the Art & Anatomy course a novel and effective approach to this endeavor. Select student artwork and a curriculum overview are provided.

The House of God is a seminal work of medical satire based on the gruelling internship experiences of Samuel Shem at the Beth Israel Hospital. Thirteen 'Laws' were offered to rationalise the seemingly chaotic patient management and flow. There have been large shifts in the healthcare landscape and practice since, so we consider whether these medical truisms are still applicable to contemporary National Health Service practice and propose updates where necessary:People are sometimes allowed to die.GOMERs (Get Out of My Emergency Room) still go to ground.Master yourself, join the multidisciplinary team.The patient is the one with the disease, but not the only one suffering.Placement (discharge planning) comes first.There is no body cavity that cannot be reached with a gentle arm and good interventional radiologists.Fit the rule to the patient rather than the patient to the rule.They can always pay you less.The only bad admission is a futile one.If you don't take a temperature you can't find a fever and if you are not going to act on it, don't do the test.Show me a BMS (best medical student) who ONLY triples my work, and I'll show you a future Foundation Year 1 doctor (FY1) who is an asset to the firm.Interpret radiology freely, but share your clinical findings with the radiologist and in a timely fashion.Doing nothing can be a viable option. These were developed in conversation with Samuel Shem, who also offers further insight on the creation of the original laws.

While medical students often fear the avalanche of knowledge they are required to learn during training, it is learning to translate that knowledge into wisdom that is the greatest challenge of becoming a doctor. Part of that challenge is learning to tolerate ambiguity and uncertainty, a difficult feat for doctors who are taught to question anything that is not evidence based or peer reviewed. The medical humanities specialize in this ambiguity and uncertainty, which are hallmarks of actual clinical practice but rarely addressed in medical education. The humanities also force reflection and contemplation-skills that are crucial to thoughtful decision making and to personal wellness. Beyond that, the humanities add a dose of joy and beauty to a training process that is notoriously frugal in these departments. Well integrated, the humanities can be the key to transforming medical knowledge into clinical wisdom.