Background Critical medical humanities critique the traditional medical humanities’ focus on producing humane doctors, arguing that it plays only a supplementary role in medical education, and advocate for understanding health, disease, and humanity from a biocultural perspective. Essentially, they emphasize structural inequalities in modern medicine. Methods This study analyzes Sally Wiener Grotta’s “One Widow’s Healing” from the perspective of critical medical humanities. In line with this critical perspective, this study highlights the human alienation and oppression caused by biopower and technology-driven (...) medicine in “One Widow’s Healing.” Results This story presents a dystopian vision of future healthcare systems in the highly technologically advanced and hyper-connected societies of 2100 and advocates for a reorientation of medicine toward a holistic, culturally informed practice that prioritizes human well-being and empathy. Conclusions By analyzing the literary response to the dystopian future, this study explores the potential dangers at the intersection of capitalism and technocentric healthcare, reflecting on the future direction of humanistic medicine. (shrink)

Background Moral distress is reported to be a critical force contributing to intensifying rates of anxiety, depression and burnout experienced by healthcare workers. In this paper, we examine the moral dilemmas and ensuing distress personally and collectively experienced by healthcare workers while caring for patients during the pandemic. Methods Data are drawn from free-text responses from a cross-sectional national online survey of Australian healthcare workers about the patient care challenges they faced. Results Three themes were derived from qualitative content analysis (...) that illuminated the ways in which moral dilemmas and distress were relationally experienced by healthcare workers: (1) the moral ambiguity of how to care well for patients amid a rapidly changing work environment; (2) the distress of witnessing suffering shared _between_ healthcare workers and patients; and (3) the distress of performing new forms of invisible work in the absence of institutional recognition. These findings reveal that moral distress was a strongly shared experience. Conclusions Findings advance understandings of moral distress as a relational experience, collectively felt, constituted, and experienced by healthcare workers. Considering how to harness collective solidarity in effectively responding to moral distress experienced across the frontline healthcare workforce is critical. (shrink)

Gottfried Benn (1886–1956) was a major 20th-century German physician-poet and essayist. He successfully completed his medical studies and worked across several hospitals and disciplines, including pathology, performing many autopsies. Later in life, Benn ran his own practice to treat skin and venereal diseases in Berlin for many years. Benn is not well-known in English-speaking countries and only a few of his poems have been translated into English so far. One possible reason for this may have been his initial enthusiasm for (...) National Socialism (as documented in essays, see below), which led to a break with other authors of his generation who had to emigrate. His novella collection "Gehirne" (Brains), published in 1918, was a significant contribution to expressionist short prose. In this work, Dr. Rönne (Benn's alter ego) searches in vain for the soul and personality in the brain matter. This leads to increasing psychological instability and depression, and Rönne can no longer carry out his medical work. The purpose of this article is to familiarize the interested reader with Benn's biography and to analyze the novella in more detail, especially in terms of the concepts of the mind’s philosophy. (shrink)