From the Chair

Seth C. Hawkins MD, FACEP

Here at the ACEP Medical Humanities Section, we’re continuing to work on emphasizing and exploring the clinical relevance of medical humanities. This has been especially important during the pandemic, when many turned to the humanities to understand and survive a world turned upside down, and now after the pandemic, as we dust off and recover skills of in-person communication and social interfacing that have atrophied over the last two years.

We’d like to remind everyone again of the critical role our “Humanities at the Bedside” program can play in this clinical milieu—it is accessible at https://www.acep.org/education/humanities-at-the-bedside/. In addition, we continue to recognize the best poetry, prose, and art in emergency medicine every year with our three awards in these categories. The winners are highlighted in this edition of our newsletter, and I’m sure you’ll find them provocative and rewarding as always. For more, you can see and share previous winners in our new book Emergency Medicine Narratives, Vol I, available at https://bookstore.acep.org/books/emergency-medicine-narratives-an-emergency-medicine-humanities-collection-509625.

As we look towards the future, we’ll be continuing to explore ways the medical humanities support, inform, and improve our abilities as clinicians and human beings. We hope to see you at the 2022 Scientific Assembly, and please don’t hesitate to reach out if there are ways the Section can support you, your work, and your humanities expressions over the coming year!