The Art of Healing
Young physicians from a local hospital gathered at The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center recently to engage in an exercise designed to help them become better doctors. The 15 physicians, first-, second-, and third-year residents at Northwell Vassar Brothers Medical Center in Poughkeepsie, spent a couple of hours carefully observing and discussing several paintings selected by Azra Dawood, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Academic Programs at The Loeb, and then shared their observations.
Dawood said the experience was designed to help the physicians use the same skills treating their patients as they had in engaging with the works of art. “It’s about using visual thinking strategies to help the physicians strengthen their close looking skills and then using those skills as a foundation for interpretation and asking meaningful questions,” Dawood explained.
Dr. Christine Kerr, Director of Narrative Medicine and Associate Program Director of Internal Medicine Residency at Northwell Vassar Brothers Medical Center, explained it this way as she prepared the young doctors for the exercise. “This is an opportunity,” Kerr said, “to turn on the parts of our brain that facilitate slow and deep learning, not just for patient care but for many other aspects of our lives.”
Over the next 90 minutes, Dawood led discussions about the works she had selected: landscapes from the Hudson River School of the mid-1800s; an early 21st century painting depicting a bucolic scene in the foreground and a nearby state prison far in the background; a 19th century work by an unknown artist depicting a physician who lived in the third century B.C. treating a patient; and a large contemporary image of a human-animal hybrid painted in brilliant colors.
As they stood in front of each painting, the physicians shared their impressions of what they were seeing and what emotions the works had generated. And as the exercise drew to a close, several of the physicians said they were certain the experience would inspire them to engage in a deeper way with their patients.
“We often tend to focus on the details of the diagnosis, test results and such, without addressing the emotional needs of our patients,” said one physician, Feras Al-Shehabi. “I think this exercise will help us keep that aspect of patient care in mind.”
“This exercise taught us how to slow down and establish a closer connection with our patients, just as we did in analyzing the paintings we saw,” said another, Meher Gujral.
First-year resident Cameron Mitchell agreed. “This exercise emphasized the soft skills needed in practicing medicine, the human side,” Mitchell said.
Kerr noted that more than 100 first-, second-, and third-year resident physicians have taken part in this exercise since the collaboration with The Loeb was launched a year ago, and she pronounced it a resounding success. “Engaging with these residents is one of the great joys of my life,” she said, “and watching them come to The Loeb and discover new sides of themselves—enhancing skills like compassion and empathy—it’s been wonderful to see.”
Dawood and Amanda Potter, Assistant Director for Learning and Community Engagement at The Loeb, said education and relationship-building are a significant part of The Loeb’s mission. “The collaboration with Dr. Kerr and Northwell-Vassar Brothers Medical Center is an important and unique example of this work, straddling as it does a kind of higher education—the post-graduate training of medical residents—and our goal of making the resources of The Loeb available to a much wider public beyond campus,” they said in a joint statement.