AMA Journal of Ethics Podcast

What can comic art about illness and health care offer patients and families as they navigate health challenges? This month on Ethics Talk, we talk with Brian Fies and Phoebe Potts, the authors of graphic novels about their experiences with health care, about how comic art is a unique and powerful medium for communicating about difficult and emotional encounters with illness and health care.

Is violence a problem for criminal justice enforcement to handle, or is it a health problem to be addressed by clinicians and other health care professionals? This month on Ethics Talk, we feature a special interview with Dr. Gary Slutkin, the author of an article in the January issue about how the health sector can help reduce violence by treating it as a contagion, about what it means to think about violence as an epidemic, and how this frame might transform the way our society responds to violence.

Global climate change has been called the greatest health threat of the twenty-first century, and its effects are already being felt in communities around the world. Clinicians have a central role to play in combating health risks related to climate change and raising awareness about its health effects, but how can individual health professionals tackle such an enormous problem? This month on Ethics Talk, we talk with photographer and medical student Jordan Emont about how art can communicate the health impact of climate change, hear from patient Louise Hobden about the health challenges of hot and humid days for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and discuss the effect climate change will have on global health and how clinicians can help intervene with Dr. Kate Weinberger.

The concept of “co-creation,” borrowed from the business sector, integrates patients into the process of developing health care products and systems, so that their perspective and input can ultimately inform the care they receive. It’s a simple but revolutionary idea, and it’s being applied across health care sectors – including in the way health care is designed. This month on Ethics Talk, we talk with designer John Meyer about what it means to think about design in health care, hear from Laura Webb, a patient who has taken a central role in creating a health care application that directly benefits her, and explore how “design thinking” can transform medical education with Dr. Bon Ku.

The Flint water crisis raised questions about the extent to which health care professionals considered environmental health to be part of their scope of practice – and whether clinicians were sufficiently attuned to the voices of residents. This month, we are joined by Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, who describes how clinicians worked to expose the water crisis in Flint, and how health professions students can bridge the gap between individual and population health in their own work as clinicians. Then we talk with Dr. Camara Jones, who discusses clinicians’ broader obligations to promote health equity and reduce health disparities, and how clinicians can combat systemic injustice in their own communities.

Clinicians have an ethical obligation to provide high-quality care to incarcerated and justice-involved patients, which means being knowledgeable and empathic about challenges these patients face. For a patient perspective, editor Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux talks with Troy Williams about what it’s like to seek medical care in a prison. We also discuss the benefits of incorporating correctional health care into medical education with Dan McGuire, a physician assistant student. Finally, we turn to Dr. Lisa Puglisi for practical strategies primary care clinicians can use in caring for patients transitioning back to communities.

Sometimes, life-saving treatments have serious negative consequences. This month, editor Amelia Thomson-DeVeaux discusses strategies for communicating about iatrogenic outcomes with Dr. Robert Nelson, a senior pediatric ethicist with the Food and Drug Administration, with a particular focus on how to enlist parents as allies in high-stress pediatric cases. Later in the episode, we talk with Gigi McMillan, the mother of a pediatric brain tumor survivor who founded , who discusses how networks of peer mentors can help families navigate these painful situations.

This month, theme editor James M. Wilkins, MD, a geriatric psychiatry fellow at Partners Healthcare, interviewed Beth Soltzberg, MBA, MSW, about innovative ways to promote health and social engagement among people living with dementia. Soltzberg is director of the Alzheimer’s/Related Family Disorders Support Program at Jewish Family & Children’s Service.

This month, theme editor Subha Perni, MD, a recent graduate of the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, interviewed Elizabeth Epstein, PhD, RN, about strategies for understanding and address moral distress in clinical settings. Dr. Epstein is an associate professor of nursing at the University of Virginia.

This month, theme editor Renee Mao, a third-year medical student at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, interviewed Dr. Tarris Rosell, PhD, DMin, MDiv, about strategies for incorporating spiritual care into oncology. Dr. Rosell is clinical professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Medicine at the University of Kansas.

This month, theme editor James Aluri, a third-year medical student at Johns Hopkins University, interviewed Dr. Autumn Fiester, PhD, about strategies for defusing “difficult” patient-clinician relationships. Dr. Fiester is assistant chair for education & training in the Division of Medical Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine.

This month, theme editor Zujaja Tauqeer, a third-year medical student at Harvard Medical School, interviewed Donald A. Barr, MD, PhD, about caring for patients with limited English language and health literacy schools. Dr. Barr is a professor in the Department of Pediatrics and the Graduate School of Education at Stanford University.

This month, theme editor William R. Smith, a third-year medical student at Emory University School of Medicine and a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, interviewed James Mohr, PhD, about how the medical profession has been regulated—and regulated itself—over the course of American history. Dr. Mohr is College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of History and Philip H. Knight Professor of Social Sciences at the University of Oregon.

This month, theme editor Terri Davis, a third-year MD student at West Virginia University School of Medicine, interviewed Ranit Mishori, MD, about how to respond to incidents of suspected human trafficking in health care settings. Dr. Mishori is a professor of family medicine and the director of the Department of Family Medicine’s Global Health Initiatives at Georgetown University School of Medicine.

This month, theme editor Jacquelyn Nestor, a fifth-year MD/PhD student at Hofstra-Northwell School of Medicine, interviewed Allen Buchanan, PhD, about how we can safely explore cutting-edge biomedical enhancements. Dr. Buchanan is the James B. Duke Professor of Philosophy at Duke University.

This month, theme editor Cameron Waldman, a second-year medical student at Albany Medical College, interviewed Aron Janssen, MD, about how healthcare professionals can better serve their transgender patients. Dr. Janssen, clinical assistant professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at NYU School of Medicine and the director of the Gender and Sexuality Service at NYU Langone Medical Center’s Child Study Center.

This month, theme editor Sarah Waliany, a fourth-year medical student at Stanford University School of Medicine, interviewed Louise Andrew, MD, JD, about mental health challenges for physicians and medical students and some strategies for colleagues to assist and intervene. Dr. Andrew is a fifth-generation physician attorney who deals with physicians in many kinds of crisis situations.

This month, theme editor Colleen Farrell, a fourth-year medical student at Harvard Medical School, interviewed Lachlan Forrow, MD, about the benefits of interprofessional collaboration and the importance of biopsychosocial approaches to patient care. Dr. Forrow is an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

This month, theme editor Margaret Cocks, MD, PhD, a third-year resident at Johns Hopkins Hospital, interviewed Theonia Boyd, MD, about ethical issues pathologists face when conducting autopsies and obtaining specimens. Dr. Boyd is an associate professor of pathology at Harvard Medical School.

This month, theme editor Abraar Karan, MD, an MPH candidate at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, interviewed Agnes Binagwaho, MD, PhD, about practical challenges Rwanda overcame and ethical questions it faced while motivating better health outcomes for its people. Dr. Binagwaho is the minister of health of Rwanda.