Saljooq M. Asif is a medical student at New York Institute Technology of Osteopathic Medicine. We welcome him to our editorial board.
The ongoing pandemic has substantially impacted all aspects of life, including modes of storytelling. Indeed, the film and television industries have had to adapt to delayed releases, prematurely concluded seasons, and cancelled projects. Some productions have attempted to integrate the real-life pandemic into their storylines, either providing us a reflection of our lived reality or denying us an escape from our surreal timeline. What I find most interesting about these endeavors is that they can be interpreted as an example of media representation—visual narratives of illness and healthcare set against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In his academic essay “‘Talk to me like I was a person you loved’: Including Patients’ Perspectives in Cinemeducation” (Intima, Fall 2021), Ewan Bowlby insightfully advocates for more nuanced portrayals of the clinical encounter in visual media in service of both physicians and patients. “Embracing the power of television,” he argues in his conclusion, “will also connect cinemeducation more closely to the realities of life for most patients and care providers.” Bowlby does not discuss film and television depictions of the novel coronavirus, but his thesis still holds to the rapidly changing landscape of contemporary entertainment and popular culture.
This intersectionality with medicine and healthcare, of course, should not surprise us. In his 1964 work Understanding Media: The Extension of Man, Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan predicted the success of the medical television drama. “Thus the TV image, in fostering a passion for depth involvement in every aspect of experience,” he proposed, “creates an obsession with bodily welfare.” This obsession can now be seen everywhere onscreen, from House to The Resident to New Amsterdam to The Good Doctor. The 17th season of Shonda Rhimes’ Grey’s Anatomy famously tackled the COVID-19 pandemic head-on, with the main protagonist contracting the virus herself and struggling to survive.
While ostensibly focusing on the patient’s experience, such medical dramas function to center the physician’s role in the clinical encounter. Indeed, the physician is the detective and diagnostician who must identify the pathology and administer treatment to the patient-as-plot device—“an exercise,” Bowlby explains, “that takes place in isolation from patients.” The video clips and scenes that Bowlby examines in his essay are thus refreshing to read—not just because the characters in question are normal human beings searching to be loved, but because these characters exist in shows not designed as medical dramas. Here, illness and disease truly do serve as one facet of the myriad lived human experience.
Reading Bowlby’s essay reminded me of own work “‘Don’t be a warrior. Be a doctor’: Healing and Love After Wartime Trauma” (Intima, Spring 2016), and offered me the opportunity to revisit it. I do not use the word “cinemeducation” in my essay, but now I understand that the fictional narratives I analyze—from Doctor Who to The Legend of Korra—are doing the same work that Bowlby describes: offering us another way to access and enhance the clinical encounter for all parties involved, this time from the patient’s perspective.
Saljooq M. Asif is a medical student at New York Institute of Technology College of Osteopathic Medicine. He is also a Lecturer in the Program in Narrative Medicine at Columbia University, where his scholarship focuses on the broader health humanities in relation to narrative ethics, racial justice, popular culture and more. His work has appeared in a wide range of outlets, including Literature and Medicine and Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics. Asif holds a Master of Science in Narrative Medicine from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Science from Boston College, where he was a member of the College of Arts & Sciences Honors Program and double majored in Biology and English. His academic essay “‘Don’t be a warrior. Be a doctor’: Healing and Love After Wartime Trauma” appeared in the Spring 2016 Intima.