WHAT IS NARRATIVE MEDICINE?

Charon R. Narrative medicine: A model for empathy, reflection, profession, and trust. JAMA. 2001 Oct 17;286(15):1897–902. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.286.15.1897

Narrative Medicine was defined in this JAMA article as:

“The effective practice of medicine requires narrative competence, that is, the ability to acknowledge, absorb, interpret, and act on the stories and plights of others. Medicine practiced with narrative competence, called narrative medicine, is proposed as a model for humane and effective medical practice. Adopting methods such as close reading of literature and reflective writing allows narrative medicine to examine and illuminate 4 of medicine's central narrative situations: physician and patient, physician and self, physician and colleagues, and physicians and society. With narrative competence, physicians can reach and join their patients in illness, recognize their own personal journeys through medicine, acknowledge kinship with and duties toward other health care professionals, and inaugurate consequential discourse with the public about health care. By bridging the divides that separate physicians from patients, themselves, colleagues, and society, narrative medicine offers fresh opportunities for respectful, empathic, and nourishing medical care.”

Narrative medicine offers health professionals a framework for authentic engagement with patients and a more patient-centered approach to make patients feel heard and understood by the practitioner. The old paradigm of “detached concern” must be replaced by narrative medicine in order to rejuvenate the critical components of care: empathy, integrity, and compassion.