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- Creators: Department of English
encounter in the medical world. The concept for this paper originates from the idea of narrative
medicine as a way to foster relationships between physicians and patients through the sharing of
stories, or narratives, between the two parties. In efforts to help teach this skill, universities and
medical schools have begun to offer courses in the medical humanities. The goal of these courses
is to teach students how to develop the skills they need to empathize and learn from their
patients’ experiences. Paired with the traditional rigor of a science-based curriculum, the medical
humanities have become part of medical schools’ efforts to “train the whole physician.”
Medical poetry is an example of the types of humanities courses that can benefit students
interested in medicine. The history of medical poetry spans across decades of literary history.
Beginning with the early references of medicine from the ancient world to the contemporary
work of the present, poets of different backgrounds and histories are discussed. Research to
support the efficacy of medical poetry include studies done on how medical poetry has impacted
students, readers, and patients. Finally, the author’s experiences as both a pre-professional
student and patient are shared to further explore the benefits that reading, and writing can bring.
Scientists use cerebral organoids, which are artificially produced miniature organs that represent embryonic or fetal brains and have many properties similar to them, to help them study developmental disorders like microcephaly. In human embryos, cerebral tissue in the form of neuroectoderm appears within the first nine weeks of human development, and it gives rise to the brain and spinal cord. In the twenty-first century, Juergen Knoblich and Madeleine Lancaster at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology in Vienna, Austria, grew cerebral organoids from pluripotent stem cells as a model to study developmental disorders in embryonic and fetal brains. One such disorder is microcephaly, a condition in which brain size and the number of neurons in the brain are abnormally small. Scientists use cerebral organoids, which they've grown in labs, because they provide a manipulable model for studying how neural cells migrate during development, the timing of neural development, and how genetic errors can result in developmental disorders.
William Withey Gull studied paraplegia, anorexia, and hormones as a physician in England during the nineteenth century. In addition to caring for patients, he described the role of the posterior column of the spinal cord in paraplegia, and he was among the first to describe the conditions of anorexia and of hypochondria. He also researched the effects of thyroid hormone deficiencies in women who had malfunctioning thyroid glands. Gull's research on thyroid hormone confirmed that chemicals in the body directly affect health, and he contributed to the foundation of endocrinology, the scientific field for the study of hormones.