405 Narrative Medicine
Health, Wellness, Medici | Registration opens 8/4/26 9:00 AM EDT
Narrative medicine is a blend of the medical story and the illness story. The medical story is the scientific basis of disease. It mirrors the scientific method, beginning with a hypothesis and by an exercise of logic and reason, drawing a conclusion. The illness story is a person’s perspective of their illness. This perspective is shaped by many things: geography, education, family dynamics, economics, culture, religion and more. The illness story doesn’t operate by logic or reason. It is shaped by all the things that make us who we are. It seeks an explanation. The illness story and the medical story should exist in equilibrium, neither competing nor conflicting with the other. This talk will offer some reasons about how these two stories have become unbalanced. It will present examples of Narrative Medicine as a philosophy of care, a clinical skill, and an educational tool that can help to maintain equanimity in the art and science of clinical practice.
Ron Lands
Dr. Ron Lands is a retired hematologist with the entirety of his medical training, medical school, residency and hematology oncology fellowship at the University of Tennessee Medical School Memphis. He also has an MFA from Queen’s University in North Carolina. He has practiced in a variety of venues – an inner-city hospital, the military, private practice and academics. Dr. Lands practiced medicine where he grew up, treating lifelong friends, a few relatives and an occasional stranger. Practicing in Appalachia is where he recognized the importance of listening to the patient’s illness story. He has published short stories, poems and essays in literary and medical journals about these experiences.