Medical performance and the ‘inaccessible’ experience of illness: an exploratory study

Abstract

We report a survey of audience members' responses (147 questionnaires collected at seven performances) and 10 in-depth interviews (five former patients and two family members, three medical practitioners) to bloodlines, a medical performance exploring the experience of haematopoietic stem-cell transplant as treatment for acute leukaemia. Performances took place in 2014 and 2015. The article argues that performances that are created through interdisciplinary collaboration can convey otherwise ‘inaccessible’ illness experiences in ways that audience members with personal experience recognise as familiar, and find emotionally affecting. In particular such performances are adept at interweaving ‘objectivist’ (objective, medical) and ‘subjectivist’ (subjective, emotional) perspectives of the illness experience, and indeed, at challenging such distinctions. We suggest that reflecting familiar yet hard-to-articulate experiences may be beneficial for the ongoing emotional recovery of people who have survived serious disease, particularly in relation to the isolation that they experience during and as a consequence of their treatment.

Research-Based Theater in the Pediatric Oncology Setting: Balancing Ethical Tensions

“…Some interview participants, particularly members of the health care team, chose to partake in panel discussions after certain performances in various settings. In these instances, as has been described for similar projects, participants willingly chose to de-anonymize themselves by virtue of joining the panel discussions (Weitkamp & Mermikides, 2016). For those who are directly identified in the piece, namely Ed and his immediate family, we have attempted to avoid a “once-only consent process.…”

“…One trainee reported that they had a sibling who had died from a brain tumor prior to the trainee entering medical school, and this trainee “appreciated the play’s truthfulness” as Ed and their sibling “went through a lot of the same struggles”. Even though it can be difficult, Ed’s Story and other RbT projects can give individuals, “a feeling that their experience was shared by someone else, and that they weren’t alone” (Weitkamp & Mermikides, 2016, p. 192).…”

Ghost in the Virtual Reality: Translating the human essence with motion captured dance

“…In terms of movement, the works developed by Katherine Boydell, Alex Mermikides, Genevieve Smith-Nunes, and Kevin Turner demonstrated how a wide range of approaches were used to generate empathy for various illnesses. Mermikides (Weitkamp & Mermikides 2016) and Smith-Nunes (Smith-Nunes & Neale 2017) both take an interdisciplinary approach to describing elements of having a physical illnesses, with the latter taking place in a VR environment. Boydell (2011) and Turner (Company Chameleon 2016) use mental health as their topics, with Turner specifically focusing on his own bipolar disorder which may have started as ABPD.…”

Lökosi̇t Tespi̇ti̇ İçi̇n Beyaz Kan Hücreleri̇ni̇n Esa Kullanilarak Siniflandirilmasi

“…Farklı tipte BKH mikroskobik görüntüleme kullanılarak tespit edilebilmektedir. Ancak bu durum, BKH'nin tipi ve kandaki oranına bağlı olarak izlenecek prosedür, doktorun tecrübe ve bilgisine bağlıdır [7].…”