Exploring (un)common ground: Communication and literature in a health care setting

Exploring the emergent identities of future physicians: Toward an understanding of the ideological socialization of osteopathic medical students

“…Such work highlighted structured training programs as constituting important elements in anticipatory socialization, and subsequently, medical educators have been striving over the past five decades to improve the training of neophyte physicians (e.g., Good & Good, 1989;Hafferty, 1988;Morowitz, 1993;Sharf, 1993;Sharf & Poirier, 1988). An analysis of curricular elements including the sequencing of activities, the kind of experiences available, and the formal mechanisms of evaluation, yields important data concerning how students are socialized.…”

Translating scholarship into practice: Communication studies reflecting the value of theory‐based research to everyday life

“…Sharf translated her findings into practice by recommending that the physician view the physician-patient interview as a co-authored, negotiated narrative so that the patient would feel emotional ownership of the recommendations for the treatment. Sharf and Poirier (1988) advocate a narrativebased training program using literary case studies as a way of improving the practitioner-patient communication of health professionals. Sharf and Poirier's applied outcome improved the development of a training course by using a narrative program.…”

“…In the context of interpersonal communication, Sharf and Poirier (1988) and Sharf (1990) studied medical interviews for the purpose of improving them for both the physician and the patient. Sharf (1990) used NPT to analyze the narrative interview data relating the patient's health problem and the physician's attempt to gain patient cooperation with the treatment procedures.…”

A community-based approach to the medical humanities

“…Literature's power lies in its ability to call up and articulate feelings and to evoke vicarious experience 11 . Reading stories encourages imagination, appreciation of subtleties and ambiguities, and the consideration of alternative viewpoints 12,13 . It increases the analytical skills of health professionals, in that the subtleties and ambiguities of literature are not unlike those of their patients 14 .…”

“…These media have been employed to foster greater communication among hospital staff members and between physicians and patients and their loved ones 25–28 . They are also used to teach healers about the experiences of illness, suffering and death, and thereby promote humanism in the practice of medicine 2–28 . Anthologies, scholarly journals, student literary magazines and compendia of articles on the rationale for teaching literature in medical schools and on the practical applications of literature in medicine have been published 29,30 (see also ) and an on‐line database of literature, medicine and the arts can be accessed via the World Wide Web 31…”