Synapse, National Connections: Spring 2009

Building on their work with Banner Desert Medical Center, Mesa and North Country Community Health Center, Flagstaff, the Arizona Humanities Council will be partnering with Phoenix VA Health Care System to offer Literature & Medicine in 2010 and 2011. Welcome to Erika Kinias, the AHC Program Officer organizing Literature & Medicine in Arizona. ::: back to top

The California Council for the Humanities is pleased to offer the Literature & Medicine program in its state. Felicia Kelley, CCH’s Senior Programs Manager, is working with Robert Hierholzer, M.D., ACOS/Research and Education of the VA Central California Healthcare System (Fresno) to organize the Council’s—and the California VA Health Care System’s—first L&M program. ::: back to top

The Florida Humanities Council is currently funding four Lit & Med programs: Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital, Hollywood; Memorial Hospital Miramar, Miramar; Memorial Hospital West, Pembroke Pines; and Memorial Regional Hospital, Hollywood. ::: back to top

The Illinois Humanities Council is in our sixth year of Literature & Medicine seminar at Central DuPage Hospital in Winfield, Illinois and in our fifth year at both Kishwaukee Community Hospital in DeKalb and the Midwest Palliative Care Center in suburban Glenview. The program has been very well received at these collaborating hospitals, and all involved are enthusiastic about the continuation of the seminar. John Stroger, Jr., Cook County Hospital, Chicago; Mt. Sinai Hospital, Chicago; and Rush University Medical Center, Chicago are also hosting the program this year. In 2010, IHC will begin work with a VA Medical Center in the state. ::: back to top

The Maine Humanities Council is pleased to announce that Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care® just completed its 12th year! Eleven Maine hospitals have been involved in 2009: Central Maine Medical Center, Lewiston; Eastern Maine Medical Center, Bangor; Maine Coast Memorial Hospital, Ellsworth; Maine Medical Center, Portland; Mayo Regional Hospital, Dover-Foxcroft; Mercy Hospital, Portland; MidCoast Hospital, Brunswick; Mount Desert Island Hospital, Bar Harbor; Sebasticook Valley Hospital, Pittsfield; Stephens Memorial Hospital, Norway; and the Togus VA Medical Center at Togus. Penobscot Bay Medical Center, a long time partner, is hosting its own version of the program.

As you can read in the feature article, we recently received a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to offer Literature & Medicine to VA health care facilities across the country. We would not be able to do this without the guidance of Tim Richardson, Dan Hamilton, Deb Hamilton, Peg Duston and Enoch Albert of the L&M group at Togus VAMC. Their help and advice has been invaluable, their support of the program tireless. Joseph O’Keeffe and the group at Vermont’s VAMC at White River Junction have also been extremely helpful.

Finally, we were saddened by the death of longtime L&M facilitator and supporter Marli Weiner. The group at Maine Coast Memorial Hospital in Ellsworth will miss her very much, as will we at MHC (you can read a short reflection on Marli and her contribution to L&M by clicking here) ::: back to top

The Maryland Humanities Council is delighted to sponsor the fifth year of Literature & Medicine at Mercy Medical Center, Baltimore in 2009. Good Samaritan Hospital of Maryland, Baltimore is also hosting a program this year. In 2010, MHC will work with VA Medical Health Care System in Baltimore. ::: back to top

Mass Humanities is pleased to report that the Massachusetts Literature & Medicine program has grown by 50 percent this year with the addition of two new host institutions: Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston, and Baystate Health Systems, centered in Springfield. One established site, UMass Memorial Hospital/UMass Medical School in Worcester, has offered the program for seven straight years, each year serving a different group of employees.

At Lahey Clinic, a number of devoted participants have been attending the seminars since the program debut there in 2004. Kristin O'Connell of Mass Humanities and Martin Newhouse, a Mass Humanities board member and the facilitator at Lahey, develop a completely new syllabus every year, a process that both enjoy enormously. Because Mass Humanities maintains a library of Literature & Medicine books that are lent to participants each year, it's possible to use the occasional out-of-print title, like the book that will end the program this June: Thomas Moran’s novel The World I Made for Her, which takes place entirely in a hospital intensive-care unit where the narrator clings to life, cared for by two Irish-born nurses, one of whom—the “her” of the title—becomes an emotional lifeline for him through his imagining of a fantasy life with her. Mass Humanities ordered 30 copies from various sources through abebooks.com, an Internet site representing thousands of independent book dealers. Among the other texts new to the Lahey program this year are David Rieff’s Swimming in a Sea of Death, his memoir of the death of his mother, Susan Sontag, and Simone de Beauvoir’s memoir of her own mother’s passing, A Very Easy Death. Both are unsparingly honest explorations of the moral complexities and emotional anguish experienced by children and parents as they grapple with decisions surrounding the end of life. Complete syllabi can be found at the Mass Humanities website.

Missouri Humanities Council is happy to report that the Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care® Group at St. Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City continues to go from strength to strength. Now in its second year, the participants come from a wide range of health care professions, including nursing, social work, patient and wellness advocacy, medical residency, and laboratories. Some attended the very first series of meetings that focused on topics such as communication, empathy, and voyeurism in healthcare; others are new to the group. Interestingly, the new members were recruited through word of mouth—little advertising was needed to attract them. The energy in the room is wonderful, and punctuated by wry laughter and insights into the human condition. The current series of six meetings is arranged around the theme of “Bodies and Voices: Minds and Emotions.” The group has read and discussed fictional works that portray autism and mental illness, plague in 17th century England and in 19th century Canada, together with factual works that present the experience of being shut in one’s body, and the challenge of making a difference in global healthcare. Discussions have centered around the question of reaching those we are told are the unreachable, the notion of sacrifice and mission in healthcare, and our reliance on technology to speak for the patient.

We are also happy to begin working with St. Louis VA Medical Center in 2010.

Nevada Humanities Nevada has kicked off its first year of Literature & Medicine with a program at Renown Regional Medical Center and the University of Nevada School of Medicine, Reno. Steve Davis, Assistant Director at Nevada Humanities, is also excited to offer the program to VA Sierra Nevada Health Care System in Reno in 2010 and 2011. ::: back to top

The New Hampshire Humanities Council is working with six hospitals this year: Avis Goodwin Community Health Care, Dover; Concord Hospital, Concord; Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon; Lakes Region General Hospital, Laconia; Littleton Regional Hospital, Littleton; Monadnock Regional Hospital; and Southern New Hampshire Medical Center, Nashua. ::: back to top

The New Jersey Council for the Humanities is pleased to report that all five hospitals that participated in Literature & Medicine in 2008 have returned for 2009. Two new scholars have become part of New Jersey’s Lit & Med family. Suzanne McConnell, fiction editor for the Bellevue Literary Review, is facilitating the Center for Humanism and Medicine at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey’s Lit & Med program. In addition to her editing duties, McConnell is an accomplished writer who has been twice nominated for the Pushcart prize. She also teaches writing at Hunter College in New York City. The Cancer Institute of New Jersey welcomes Ann Jurecic, Assistant Professor of English at Rutgers University as their facilitator. Jurecic’s research touches on issues of narrative medicine and she has published articles such as “Neurodiversity” in College English and “Mindblindness: Autism, Writing and the Problem of Empathy,” in the journal, Literature and Medicine. NJCH is proud to add McConnell and Jurecic to its roster of stellar scholars.

New Jersey’s eclectic readings in 2009 include graphic novels, memoir and fiction. Hospitals will discuss Maus, Part I by Art Spiegelman, Everyman by Philip Roth, Planet of the Blind by Stephen Kuusisto, Saturday by Ian McEwen, and Expecting Adam by Martha Beck, among others. In addition, two sites are planning extra activities in honor of National Poetry Month in April. Cancer Institute of New Jersey participants will attend a poetry reading at Rutgers University, while Dr. Diane Kaufman, liaison for UMDNJ, is coordinating a Poetry in Medicine session with a local publisher.

Barbara Hale, social worker and liaison at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, Rita Jacobs, Montclair State University professor and scholar at Mountainside Hospital, and Emily Hartsough, Medical Education Coordinator at Cooper University Hospital at last summer’s L&M meeting for facilitators and liaisons at the Rutgers Club, Rutgers University.

New York Humanities Council is happy to become involved in the Literature & Medicine program. Program Officer Anna Links is heading up this effort and will be working with the VA NY Harbor Healthcare System in Manhattan in 2010.

Donovan McKnight of the North Carolina Humanities Council reports that NCHC will work with Durham VA Medical Center to offer a Lit & Med program at their facility. Veteran L&M facilitator, Todd Savitt, will work with the group. Donovan, Todd, and the liaison at DVAMC, Theresa Yuschok, will attend the Lit & Med Training Institute in Chicago this June. ::: back to top

Jack Shortlidge, Program Officer for Ohio Humanities Council reports that OHC’s first Literature & Medicine seminar started off well. He writes, “We had our first program with 15 staff members of the Rainbow Babies and Children’s University Hospital in Cleveland on September 22nd. We’re using the Imagine What It’s Like anthology as the reader for the program; on the first evening, the participants discussed two stories: “People Like That Are the Only People Here” by Lorrie Moore and “What Remains” by Emma Donoghue. Georgina Dodge, who attended the L&M training workshop in Chicago in 2008, facilitated the seminar.” The group met five more times after that. ::: back to top

Humanities South Carolina will be working with Veterans Administration Hospital in Charleston in 2010 and 2011; the site is still being determined. Welcome to TJ Wallace, the HSC Program Officer who will now be organizing Lit & Med in South Carolina. HSC is also hosting L&M at Mary Black Memorial Hospital, Spartanburg and Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System. ::: back to top

South Dakota Humanities’ Sherry DeBoer and Jay Willms will work with the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center to offer Literature & Medicine at that facility in 2009 and 2010.::: back to top

Vermont Humanities Council is hosting Literature & Medicine at Fletcher Allen Health Care, Burlington; Gifford Medical Center, Randolph; Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital, St. Johnsbury; Northwestern Medical Center, St. Albans; Porter Medical Center, Middlebury; Rutland Regional Medical Center, Rutland; Vermont State Hospital, Waterbury; and Veterans Administration Medical & Regional Office Center, White River Junction. Welcome to Mark Fitzsimmons, who is now organizing L&M for the Vermont council.

We at Maine Humanities Council would like to thank Chaplain Joseph O’Keeffe of the VAMC at White River Junction for his help with our work to involve more VAMCs across the country in Literature & Medicine. White River Junction VAMC was the second VA medical facility to host a Literature & Medicine program, and Chaplain O’Keeffe and the rest of the L&M group there are strong supporters of the program. They report that they are excited to begin their fifth year and are eager to see other VAMCs get involved. I had the privilege to sit in on their discussion of March by Geraldine Brooks earlier this spring. March is a marvelous book that fills in the story of the father who was away fighting in the Civil War in Little Women. Facilitator Suzanne Brown pointed out how much was left out of the main character’s letters home in an attempt “to spare” his family, leading to rich discussion of the burdens that soldiers, those who are ill, families, and health care professionals carry with them that they feel would be too painful for others to hear, or that they feel cannot be understood by others. ::: back to top

Katie Strotman of the Fairfax County Library attended our very first Literature & Medicine Summer Institute, and since that time has organized a Literature & Medicine program for local health care professionals through the library. In 2009 they will sponsor a program for Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church. The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities is supporting this effort. ::: back to top

Isabel del Valle, Director of Humanities at Pallium Latinoamerica, (a medical institution of palliative care in Buenos Aires) had long wanted to find ways to connect the humanities most closely with medical care. After attending the Literature & Medicine Institute in 2008, she has worked hard to start Literature & Medicine in her home country of Argentina.

The first two sites are in Buenos Aires. Pallium Latinoamérica, a health care association devoted to the care of patients who suffer from terminal cancer, is a natural fit for Literature & Medicine. Pallium Latinoamerica has a postgraduate training program in palliative care for physicians, nurses, social workers, psychologists, priests and other health team members, as well as education at the undergraduate and community level. It also emphasizes education in humanistic dimensions of the process of illness and suffering (through literature, philosophy, and history), clinical research in Palliative Medicine, and operates the Palliative Home Care and Day Centre Program.

Isabel will facilitate the group, made up of nurses, physicians, psychologists, social workers, support staff, a psychodramatist, and a priest. The readings include: Welcome to Cancerland by Barbara Ehrenreich; Cancer Journal by Audre Lorde; Slow Man by Coetzee; At the Will of the Body: Reflections on Illness by Arthur W. Frank; Patrimony by Philip Roth; Illness as a Metaphor by Susan Sontag and Ceremonia del Adiós by Simone de Beauvoir.

Hospital Bonorino Udaondo, the second site, is a public health care institution specializing in gastroenterology pathologies. This institution is the most important in its type in Argentina, and for the past 70 years has focused on both medical assistance and education. Participating staff represent the departments of nutrition, gynecology, oncology, gastroenterology, and the laboratory. Their readings include “The Eleventh” by Henri Barbusse; Philoctetes by Sophocles; and selections from the anthologies Imagine What It’s Like and A Life in Medicine.

Isabel reports that the program is being well received and hopes to involve two additional sites very soon. Read an interview with Isabel del Valle. ::: back to top