Healing Arts: RhetoricalTechneas Medical (Humanities) Intervention

Serving All Who Served: An Analysis of the VA's Visual and Digital Rhetorics for Welcoming Sexual and Gender Minority Veterans Into VA Care

“…In the medical humanities, narrative has served as a “primary bridging term” providing what Edwell, Singer, and Jack () describe as “a strong foundation for bridging the gap between patients and doctors, for helping doctors reflect on their clinical practice, and for writing as a mode of healing” (p. 50). However, as they point out, narrative alone is not enough, “especially when we consider conditions that do not lend themselves easily to narrative resolution” (p. 50).…”

“…Informed by the generative and practical nature of techne, we argue that the invention of new guidelines, protocols, and policies can contribute to improved patient care. Thus, with a focus on techne as “generative for thinking more broadly about the health sciences, including patients’ health discourses and practices,” (Edwell et al, , p. 52), we offer the following recommendations, which are grounded in the results presented above and our analysis of those data.…”

“…Balancing policy with culture in this way would avoid the kinds of problematic information asymmetries discussed above and further contribute to the identity construction of patients who see their lived experiences reflected in the visual and digital rhetorics. Through this rhetorical process of identification, patients are addressed in ways that encourage them to “agents of their own healthcare” (Edwell et al, , p. 52). Further, use of robust inclusive terminology and local resources demonstrates a cultural awareness and patient‐centered investment that extends beyond official policy language.…”

“…We maintain that conditions and context surrounding the digital and visual rhetorics analyzed here do not lend themselves easily to narrative resolution. Instead, we adopt the working definition of rhetorical and medical techne offered by Edwell et al (), which they argue “can be distilled into guidelines, protocols, and policies (although it may not preexist in those forms)” (p. 51). Edwell et al's analysis shows that “a rhetorical techne can enrich research and productively engage the medical community” (p. 50).…”

“…Drawing from Atwill's () Aristotelian notion of techne , which connects it with the “capacity to recall, combine, and evaluate” (p. 81), the consistency in content and location of this information is a crucial protocol which all VA locations should be able to quickly and easily implement. Doing so would directly contribute to the development of what Edwell et al () describe as “patients’ experiential knowledge and embodied practices that enable them to determine and administer care to their own bodies” (p. 52). In the context of the rhetoric of health and medicine, and especially in the context of the specific rhetorical exigency that VA locations are currently facing in communicating with LGBT veterans, prototypical page elements can be part of a rhetorical strategy designed to accomplish the VA's stated goal of providing veterans with “ convenient access to information about VA health benefits, their medical records, health information, expert advice, and the ongoing support needed to make informed health decisions” (VA, , emphasis in original).…”