Using the science fiction film invaders from Mars in a child psychiatry seminar

The prism model: advancing a theory of practice for arts and humanities in medical education

INTRODUCTION

The arts and humanities have transformative potential for medical education. Realizing this potential requires an understanding of what arts and humanities teaching is and what it aims to do. A 2016 review of exclusively quantitative studies mapped three discursive positions (art as intrinsic to, additive to or curative for medicine) and three epistemic functions (art for mastering skills, perspective taking, and personal growth and activism). A more inclusive sample might offer new insights into the position and function of arts and humanities teaching in medical education.

METHODS

Informed by this 2016 framework, we conducted discursive and conceptual analyses of 769 citations from a database created in a recent scoping review. We also analyzed the 15 stakeholder interviews from this review for recurring themes. These three analyses were iteratively compared and combined to produce a model representing the complex relationship among discursive functions and learning domains.

RESULTS

The literature largely positioned arts and humanities as additive to medicine and focused on the functions of mastering skills and perspective taking. Stakeholders emphasized the intrinsic value of arts and humanities and advocated their utility for social critique and change. We offer a refined theory of practice-the Prism Model of four functions (mastering skills, perspective taking, personal insight and social advocacy)-to support more strategic use of arts and humanities in medical education across all learning domains.

DISCUSSION

The Prism Model encourages greater pedagogical flexibility and critical reflection in arts and humanities teaching, offering a foundation for achieving its transformative potential.

Psychopathology in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: the Use of Star Wars' Dark Side in Teaching

Star Wars is well known, timeless, universal, and incorporated into shared culture. Trainees have grown up with the movies, and based on their enduring popularity, attending psychiatrists are likely to have seen them too. This article highlights psychopathology from the Dark Side of Star Wars films which can be used in teaching. These include as follows: borderline and narcissistic personality traits, psychopathy, PTSD, partner violence risk, developmental stages, and of course Oedipal conflicts.

Teaching Psychopathology in a Galaxy Far, Far Away: The Light Side of the Force

Star Wars films are among the top box office hits of all time. The films have been popular internationally for almost 40 years. As such, both trainees and attending psychiatrists are likely to be aware of them. This article highlights a vast array of psychopathology in Star Wars films which can be useful in teaching, even when the characters are considered the "good guys". Included are as follows: histrionic, obsessive-compulsive, and dependent personality traits, perinatal psychiatric disorders, prodromal schizophrenia, pseudo-dementia, frontal lobe lesions, pathological gambling, and even malingering. As such, Star Wars has tremendous potential to teach psychiatric trainees about mental health issues.

An approach to finding teaching moments on families and child development in Disney films

OBJECTIVE

In the interest of finding "teaching moments in film" for psychiatric education and education on child development, the author describes an approach to analyzing Disney--and potentially other children's films--based on specifically observing family structure at the beginning and ending of the story, developmental stage and gender of the protagonist, the developmental crisis, and the external change agent and/or stressor.

METHODS

The author considered a convenience sample of ten popular Disney films.

RESULTS

A wide variety of family structures and developmental stages and challenges were observed in the reviewed films.

CONCLUSIONS

A matrix approach such as the one illustrated may help psychiatric educators to select effective teaching moments from Disney and other children's films.

Adolescent transition: Ordinary People (1980), Fly Away Home (1996), and (500) Days Of Summer (2009)

Five important transitional tasks of adolescent development are (i) taming the upsurge of desires and impulses, both sexual and aggressive, into constructive and creative directions; (ii) establishing independence from infantile family ties (while maintaining some involvement with the family of origin); (iii) reconciling self-preoccupations with social attachments; (iv) reworking identifications, especially sexual; and (v) establishing romantic attachments and solidifying ongoing stable love relationships. These tasks are illustrated with the help of three movies, namely Ordinary People, Fly Away Home, and (500) Days of Summer.

Using television shows to teach communication skills in internal medicine residency

BACKGROUND

To address evidence-based effective communication skills in the formal academic half day curriculum of our core internal medicine residency program, we designed and delivered an interactive session using excerpts taken from medically-themed television shows.

METHODS

We selected two excerpts from the television show House, and one from Gray's Anatomy and featured them in conjunction with a brief didactic presentation of the Kalamazoo consensus statement on doctor-patient communication. To assess the efficacy of this approach a set of standardized questions were given to our residents once at the beginning and once at the completion of the session.

RESULTS

Our residents indicated that their understanding of an evidence-based model of effective communication such as the Kalamazoo model, and their comfort levels in applying such model in clinical practice increased significantly. Furthermore, residents' understanding levels of the seven essential competencies listed in the Kalamazoo model also improved significantly. Finally, the residents reported that their comfort levels in three challenging clinical scenarios presented to them improved significantly.

CONCLUSION

We used popular television shows to teach residents in our core internal medicine residency program about effective communication skills with a focus on the Kalamazoo's model. The results of the subjective assessment of this approach indicated that it was successful in accomplishing our objectives.