Making Health Humanities Teaching Sustainable

Curators Emily Beck and Lois Hendrickson envisioned a unique collaboration between the Medical School and the Wangensteen Historical Library of Biology and Medicine (WHL) on the Twin Cities campus: creating and integrating innovative active-learning sessions and resources into areas of the Medical School curriculum and MPact Health Courses. Research assistant Liz Root skillfully modified instructional materials by integrating narratives from historical documents that provide a novel and essential foundation, methodology and resource for effective health equity education. Focusing on MPact-related goals of diversity, inclusion and equity, this team provided students with an inclusive perspective on the history of health that is directly applicable to their futures as clinical providers.  

Their remarkable grant work continues to grow and impact beyond the Medical School. Several sessions were redeployed in the School of Public Health’s Summer Institute courses. Likewise, several impressive history-focused health humanities sessions were integrated into an epidemiology course that benefits undergraduate Public Health students. The grantees also accepted requests to develop at least two clerkships: one related to the history of anesthesia and the other related to historical research methods. Finally, the Canadian Journal of Health History will internationally showcase their important work detailing methods for historically focused health humanities sessions. As this team continues to integrate WHL’s historical collections materials into a wide range of venues, they undoubtedly ensure a sustained ability to meet the needs of health sciences students.