Our Mission
The Narrative Medicine Society at UCLA is dedicated to fostering communication, empathy, and inclusivity by providing a platform for physicians to navigate and articulate in a literary manner how patient narratives have productively shaped the treatment plans they develop and implement. In this way, the Narrative Medicine Society at UCLA aims to bridge the gap between the biopsychosocial circumstances that occur concurrently with patient illness and the practices of physicians in their pursuit of clinical and medical beneficence.
What is Narrative Medicine?
Narrative medicine is an international discipline at the intersection of humanities, the arts, clinical practice, and health care justice with conceptual foundations in narratology, phenomenology, and liberatory social theory. Arising at Columbia University in 2001, Narrative Medicine has developed principles and practices that equip clinicians to better comprehend their patients’ experiences and perspectives so as to deliver equitable and effective health care. Narrative medicine also engages with writers, artists, scholars, activists, and human services professionals of all kinds to improve health care from the perspectives of patients and providers.
Purpose
The purpose of Narrative Medicine is to bring to light the importance of patient narratives so as to elevate patient care beyond accurate diagnoses, and advance the practice of medicine to one that also considers the personal, relational, and psychological perceptions that occur with illness. Also, Narrative Medicine aims to promote unheard voices and reestablish the primacy of narrative as one of the many cores of medicine.
