Conference Report by Dana Alalwan
Dana Alalwan is a biomedical health and life science student at University College Dublin. She attended MindReading 2018 as part of a summer research project, and writes here about her experience:
The Oxford English dictionary defines literature as “Written works, especially those considered of superior or lasting artistic merit”, and medicine as “The science or practice of the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease”. One may not find a practical link between the two disciplines, however, the Mind reading conference held at the University of Birmingham argues otherwise. This conference utilises the relationship between the doctor and patient by using literature in practice, this manner is often referred to as narrative medicine and it helps in bridging the gap between the two parties. The mind reading conference is a collaboration between UCD Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the Diseases of Modern Life Project at St Annes College, Oxford and the University of Birmingham. I am a biomedical health and life science student and I attended this conference as part of a summer research project. I listened to the 2017 Sound Cloud talks before attending this year’s conference for the first time, and I did not expect to gain as much knowledge as I did when attending this conference, as professionals shared valuable insights from their clinical careers, but also about their experience on the ground in medicine and academia.
The conference hosted a range of topics that related to the main theme, caring for carers. Professor Brendan Drumm opened the conference and spoke about clinician’s burnout and how the health system needs to be re-evaluated in order to work effectively. One of the workshops co-hosted between Dr Elizabeth Barrett and Dr Katherine Furman called “From Greek Tragedy to Twitter: Understanding Doctors’ Vulnerability”, illustrated the need to address burnout problems among healthcare professionals. Often healthcare professionals are reluctant to seek support when stigma is an issue. Many of the recent editorials in medical publications recognise this, and clinicians are not only at risk of mental health disorders but they also have high rates of completed suicide. Often, they do not seek out the healthcare that their patients might be receiving. How do we talk about the issues surrounding this? How do health care professionals maintain empathy without encountering burnout? Narrative interventions, such as Schwartz rounds and Balint groups, Dr Barrett argued, might help healthcare professionals in dealing with burnout. But how might literature help even further at an individual level? We talk a lot about reflective practice- but where do we practice it? How can we build skills? Dr Furman, spoke about the concept of “good life” or eudemonia and made a link between the Greek ethics during the Aristotelian era and the current time, demonstrating how this concept of “the good life” changes in different story settings across Greek mythology. Throughout this workshop, we discussed possible ways in which our own notions of the good life might be challenged or redefined by illness, or within a medical context, and the implications of medical ethics, bad luck, and unexpected occurrences.
Continuing this theme of clinicians and wellness, Professor Femi Oyebode spoke about shame and disgust, and the ways in which we modify our behaviour because of a deep-seated awareness of how others view us. Drawing upon a range of theatrical works, from Ancient Greece to twentieth-century America, Professor Oyebode considered representations of madness and the prominent role of shame in our experience of illness. Dr Neil Vickers then turned to the kinds of shame experienced by the ill, whose minds or bodies have seemingly failed them, and the notion of the ‘pariah syndrome’ – the frequent isolation of the ill and their loved ones.
A particularly illuminating workshop was that run by Action of Postpartum Psychosis (APP), featuring a group of women who explored the ways that literature had helped them. They felt that this proved the theory that literature could help with mental health disorders was the Post-Partum psychosis, writing yourself healthy. Three amazing ladies, Sue McKendrick, Jenny Pagdin, and Fiona Putnam, each of whom had suffered the illness themselves, talked about their own experiences with Post-Partum psychosis after it was introduced by Jessica Heron who is a Senior Research Fellow in Perinatal Psychiatry and Director of the National charity, Action on Postpartum Psychosis (APP). Jenny, Sue, and Fiona expressed their stories with PP with different types of literature like poetry and music.
After attending this conference, I decided that I needed to read more literature not just for pleasure, but also for my mental and physical well being. The mind reading toolkit that can be found on the UCD school of medicine web page would help me in choosing what to read, as I do feel that I will be reading against the clock.
Dana Alalwan