storytelling in medicine

This is the sound of a cafeteria in the Divinity school. During the lunch hour, many conversations are occuring while occupants are sitting at long, narrow 8-person tables. The close proximity in which these discussions take place can still be heard as some get up to bus their plates and silverware before parting ways. Similar to the Divinity Cafe, hospital cafeterias are filled with a diverse array of personnel: physicians, nurses, other healthcare staff, patients, and families. These various groups might coexist in the same place, but they might bus their trays before ever intermingling. However, the shared eating space can still remind us of the communal aspects of healthcare.

This is the sound of a door opening into the Divinity school. The abrupt manner in which it is opened captures the cacophonous sound, which people might perceive in various ways. The doors of the church, like the doors of the hospital, carry much weight. In the church, doors can keep people in and keep people out. In the hospital, the opening of a door can mean invasion, uncertainty, and fear for both the patient waiting on the other side and the person opening it. With the opening of both doors, however, there is an invitation to mutual vulnerability. It is our hope that the opening of doors in hospital might take on a bit more of this invitation.