NARRATIVE PALLIATIVE CARE

A Basic Narrative Medicine Workshop Syllabus March 23-25, 2018

FRIDAY, MARCH 23 Registration begins at 1:30 pm in Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC), Room 301

1:30 Registration and refreshments | Location: Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC) Room 301 2:30 Introduction of the Workshop in Narrative Palliative Care | Rita Charon, MD, PhD

Location: Alumni Auditorium (enter at the Physicians & Surgeons building at 630 W 168th Street) 3:00 The Myth of Chiron–Responding to Suffering and Requests for Physician Assisted Suicide

Craig Blinderman MD, MA, FAAHPM | Location: Alumni Auditorium This plenary will explore the question of suicide in the face of a terminal illness. In Albert Camus' famous essay, "The Myth of Sisyphus," the philosophical problem of suicide in light of the absurdity of human existence is explored. Conscious awareness, typified by Sisyphus, is the response to the Absurd, according to Camus; not simply ending one's life. As physicians, we are sometimes asked to help our patients who are struggling with existential distress to help them hasten their deaths. In some States, this is a legal option. The question I will be addressing is how do we respond to suffering, how can we better hear these requests as "existential cries of help." The myth of Chiron, "the wounded healer" of Greek mythology, serves as an interesting parallel to Sisyphus. What does Chiron's sacrifice and devotion to healing and teaching tell us about how we should respond to our own patients' suffering, especially those requesting to hasten their death? Assigned Reading: Ethics and the Legalization of Physician-Assisted Suicide: An American College of Physicians Position Paper by Lois Snyder Sulmasy, JD, and Paul S. Mueller, MD, MPH

4:00 Break 4:15 Reading: Can We Let the Baby Go? | Nellie Hermann, MFA | Location: Alumni Auditorium

Creative presentation by Novelist Nellie Hermann from her story. 5:15 Small Group Seminars | Locations: See small groups assignments 6:30 Cocktail Reception | Location: Coogan’s Restaurant: 4015 Broadway (between 168th & 169th St)

SATURDAY, MARCH 24 All sessions held in Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC)

8:30 Continental Breakfast | Location: HSC 4th Floor (enter building, turn right for elevators to 4th floor) 9:00 Making Sense | BJ Miller, MD | Location: HSC Room 401

Why? It’s probably the most important question in healthcare and probably also the least likely to be asked, and that’s probably because it’s hard to answer. Why am I sick? Why do this procedure? Why do I have to die? Why was I born? Underlying most visits to the doctor are crises of meaning. As practitioners, as people, how do we help? A good place to start might be the material world, the exact thing we have to leave behind with death. The body, that thing where consequence is felt. This talk will dig into aesthetics, and see if we can’t get a handle on the raw material of meaning and experience | Location: Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC) Room 401

Assignment: Visit a museum, stare at a painting, go to the theater, in some way absorb art and think about why people make art.

10:30 Break 10:45 Small Group Seminars | Location: See small groups assignments

Required Reading: SHHH by No Violet Bulawayo

***Note: This is the most important to be read ahead of time, as it is used in the Saturday morning small group.***

12:15 Lunch | Location: HSC 4th Floor 1:30 Creativity, Mediation and Representation: Toward Managing Difficult Experiences

Maura Spiegel, PhD & Nellie Hermann, MFA | Location: HSC Room 401

Assigned Reading: • The Aquarium, by Aleksandar Hemon • From Trauma to Writing: A Theoretical Model for Practical Use, by Marian M. MacCurdy • Narrative Medicine and Contemplative Care at the End of Life by Bradley Lewis • “This Is What We Do, and These Things Happen: Literature, Experience, Emotion, and

Relationality in the Classroom,” by Maura Spiegel, PhD and Danielle Spencer, MS, from The Principles and Practice of Narrative Medicine

• Chapter 7, “Close Reading: The Signature Method of Narrative Medicine,” by Rita Charon, MD, PhD, from The Principles and Practice of Narrative Medicine

3:00 Break 3:15 Small Group Seminars | Location: See small groups assignments 4:45 Adjournment

#palliativecareNMworkshop

@NarrativeMed /ColumbiaNarrativeMedicine @narrative_medicine lnked.in/narrativemedicine

SUNDAY, MARCH 25 All sessions held in Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC)

8:30 Continental Breakfast | Location: HSC 4th Floor 9:00 Narrative Ethics and the Embodiment of Clinical Care

Craig Irvine PhD & Deepthiman Gowda, MD, MPH, MS | Location: HSC Room 401 Participants will consider narrative ethics as a framework to explore the embodied nature of both illness and clinical care. | Location: Hammer Health Sciences Building (HSC) Room 401

Assigned Readings: • The Aquarium, by Aleksandar Hemon • The Ethics of Self Care, by Craig Irvine, PhD

10:30 Break 10:45 Small Group Seminars | Location: See small groups assignments 12:15 Lunch | Location: HSC 4th Floor 1:30 Small Group Seminars | Location: See small groups assignments 3:00 Break 3:15 Panel Discussion on Narrative and Practice: Clinicians using Narrative Methods in Palliative Care

Moderated by Deepthiman Gowda, MD, MPH, MS | Location: HSC Room 401

5:00 Adjournment