ABOUT KATHLEEN

Thoughts of a Toronto-based PR consultant. A focus on the PR profession and the charitable sector, with forays into arts, society and politics.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Doctor, read thy novel

Doctors-in-training are now being required to read Virginia Woolf and Chekov? Love it!!! Makes me feel like I'm that much closer to that medical degree my parents desired for me...

From the article in the New York Times...

“We’re teaching the humanities to our residents, and it’s making them better doctors,” said Dr. Richard Panush, a rheumatologist and chairman of the department of medicine at Saint Barnabas. The idea of combining literature and medicine — or narrative medicine as it is sometimes called — has played a part in medical education for over 40 years. Studies have repeatedly shown that such literary training can strengthen and support the compassionate instincts of doctors."

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