Performing medicine

The Performing Medicine project is an unusual collaboration between a theatre company (The Clod Ensemble), a medical school (Barts and The London) and a Drama Department (Queen Mary, University of London).

The project, which aims to enhance medical students training using the arts, recently won the Times Higher Award for Excellence and Innovation in the Arts. In November 2008 they will present a series of seminars, workshops and performances in collaboration with the Wellcome Collection.

Performing Medicine programmes a wide variety of courses for medical students and health professionals. Some focus on practical skills – helping students to understand how their body language and vocal delivery may impact on patients. Others might involve spending the day with an architect looking at how buildings influence health, or with a photographer examining how we look and see. 

The courses aim to ease the transition of doctors from academically bright learners of medical information, to people who are confident with their patients and peers in the workplace.

Suzy Willson, Director of Performing Medicine, explains where the idea for the project came from. ' After spending time as a theatre student thinking about the body as poetic and expressive I was very shocked when I found myself visiting friends and relatives in hospitals. It seemed to me that despite best intentions some of the staff had no idea how their body language was affecting me! I wondered if some of the things I had learned in my own training could be useful to health professionals’.  

In 2000, she piloted a course at Guys Hospital and the project is now delivering workshops at Barts and the London, Kings and Imperial. 

Students have been receptive, she says.  ‘The students are very open to and hungry for new ideas. Our courses are very popular – especially our ‘How do I look’ sessions which give one-to-one attention to specific problems students are having with presentation skills.’ Students can either opt for just one or two sessions, or to take a fortnight-long module exploring the uses of arts in medical training in more depth.

There have been good practical effects.  Willson mentions one student who found that physical movement and relaxation classes really helped how he performed in surgery.  He's now doing a research piece about exercise for surgeons.  The courses also encourage students to engage with ideas about cultural difference. Often students are very anxious about engaging with patients who are very different from themselves – the arts provide a provocative platform on which to unravel some of the issues at stake and help students prepare for the challenges that being a doctor in the 21^st century brings.

Willson adds ‘issues around negotiating power are very common amongst medical students.  Colleagues can be just as much of a challenge as patients, especially dealing with more senior people in very hierarchical organisations’.

But will the skills students pick up be kicked out of them in the tough couple of years as junior doctors?  Willson argues that the training actually helps with very challenging situations.   

'Our courses will hopefully give them some skills to help them survive the years ahead! Looking after yourself, in the midst of a stressful and demanding job, is a discipline in itself''.

The courses aim to prevent doctors being emotionally exhausted by their jobs.  'It's important to find the balance of how you remain engaged whilst protecting yourself... how to go home and not take your patients problems with you...'  

In a profession that so famously fails to look after its own health, these are vital skills to learn.    The Performing Medicine team are keen that their work is mainstreamed into the medial curriculum.  If they succeed, there is  a real possibility that work of this kind can influence the next generation of doctors, with knock on effects for both the profession and its patients.

Find out more about Performing Medicine

Read our interview with Professor Chris Fowler, head of education at Barts about his plans for an integrated health element in the curriculum.