A retired hematologist explores the importance of clinical communication and health literacy by close reading two pieces published in this journal.
Read moreLeave Work at Work
Which story is heard, and by whom? Which story do people want to hear, and why? A COVID nurse provides explanations as well as recommendations about storytelling.
Read moreObjectivity versus Art: A Reflection on Technology in Medicine
A physician-novelist ponders the troubling implications of the increasing technologization of health care and its encroachment on the art of medicine.
Read moreAfter Testimony, Tribute
A testimony and tribute to one writer’s mother who passed away from COVID-19.
Read moreSeeing Through
A retired nurse remarks on what she has witnessed in the hospital setting via studio art and poetry published in this very journal.
Read moreA Moment of Intimacy
A writer questions the dynamics that shape—as well as disguise—not only the clinical encounter, but also personhood, identity, and intimacy.
Read moreHow Patients Teach Us by Catalina Flores
A nurse contemplates how and why patients are made to feel like burdens—simply for having several needs.
Read moreThe Importance of Touch in Medicine (and Beyond) by neonatologist Katherine C. White
A retired neonatologist recalls her time in the NICU when the specter of HIV loomed large—and laments the precautions against touch that have returned with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Read moreOn "Where Are You, Mary Oliver?" A pediatric ER doctor contemplates what two poets taught her about healing
A pediatric emergency physician reflects on the enduring power and comfort of Mary Oliver’s poetry during difficult times.
Read moreWhere do you turn for comfort? A reflection on Popsicles, Tater Tots and hospital gift shops by internist Ben Goldenberg
“Sometimes the job we do isn’t about fixing what’s wrong but rather helping each other survive within the confines of our brokenness.” Artwork: The Art of Being Here by Kirilee West Spring 2022 Intima
Read moreSurprising Behavior in the Pandemic
A palliative care nurse analyzes poetry and studio art created in response to the ongoing pandemic—and appreciates how these different pieces generate surprising parallels.
Read moreThe Chance to Say Goodbye... or Not: Thoughts about being prepared—or surprised— by death by end-of-life doula Virginia Chang
An end-of-life doula reflects on their experiences with dying patients and concludes by offering three life lessons.
Read moreThe Role of the Medical Television Drama in Cinemeducation
What is the purpose of the now-ubiquitous medical television drama in the age of pandemics? And whose voice does it center: the physician’s or the patient’s?
Read moreFacelessness and the Glass Between Us: Finding Connection In the Era of Covid by Hannah Dischinger, MD
COVID has gotten in the way of so much, literally. It floods lungs with heavy fluid, making it impossible to do meaningful gas exchange. It has become unfathomably, sickly politicized, another ideological wedge between two sides of an already divided country. The currencies of medicine—vulnerability, respect, trust, among others—have become that much harder to exchange. As I read Dr. Uhrig’s beautiful “Facelessness,” I felt some of these barriers lessen in knowing I’m in good company as I think about these new dynamics.
Read moreWhat I Learned about the ICU: A Reflection by Benjamin Rattray
In her essay “The Shape of the Shore” (Spring 2020 Intima), Rana Awdish takes us into the intensive care unit during the ravages of a pandemic. She shows us “…the desperate thrashing patients on the other side of the glass” and “…the sticky blood on the floor.” As I read the words, my breath becomes shallow as fear and grief pummel into me. Somewhere deep, beneath the shrouds of consciousness, the words resonate, and I feel as though I am slipping beneath an indigo sea.
Read moreFinding Hope Outside of the Hospital by internal medicine resident Vanessa Vandoren. “Something More Beautiful than the Lives We Were Living.”
Even before the pandemic, the grueling hours of residency left little time for a life outside of it. Once residency starts, your work responsibilities expand astronomically, leaving little room for other aspects of a normal human life: relationships, interests, time alone, time to take care of basic needs.
Read moreOn Trauma, Hope and Dragonslayers, an essay by hospital-based physical therapist Galen Schram
Can what we know about PTSD in frontline workers who treated the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings help us understand how to care for our COVID-19 frontline workers? What will be done to understand and treat race-based traumatic stress, a term I hadn’t heard until this summer?
Read moreFinding What's Essential in Just Laundry: Painting and Poetry in Dialogue By Alexis Rehrmann
In both the painting and the poem, these particulars are gone but the objects remain and hold an impression of that past life. There’s honor in caring for these objects, in both our daily work and our creative lives.
Read moreMy COVID Hero: How Art Helped Me Reflect on a Global Pandemic by Dr. Brandon Mogrovejo
One late evening, just two months into my intern year in Pediatrics and seven months into a forever changed New York City, I sat down and drew. I drew from a place of anxiety, working the equivalent of two full-time jobs in a hospital during a time when the people I care for, my loved ones and my patients, were under great strain.
Read moreCaught between Floating and Drowning, a reflection about poetry, memory and adapting to chaos by Mikayla Brockmeyer
A state of flux. The COVID-19 pandemic has induced a state of “How will I react to _____?” Listlessness and emotional exhaustion bring about feelings of isolation and longing to be somewhere we are not. Yet, in learning to modify behaviors, collaborations have emerged.
In the opening couplet to Sheila Kelly’s poem entitled “Breathe” (Fall 2017 Intima). she sets the stage and introduces a poignant metaphor, depicting calmness, yet incertitude.
You are floating in the swimming pool again.
Your childhood best friend rises like prayer.
“Breathe” was penned well before the current pandemic, yet the feelings of serenity and safety one day, and panic the next, expressed are relevant today. Using a second-person narrative, she paints a vivid picture of a disjointed home life, sifting through old, painful memories. In the poem, the main character is catapulting between chaos and “floating in the swimming pool.” At the end, I interpret a sense of adaptation from the character that leaves a residue of hope.
In my essay “Turbulent Undertow” (Fall 2020 Intima), parallel feelings are grappled with, as I describe a surfing attempt, and later, my experience as a hospitalist scribe. Woven together, I write about two near-drowning experiences: on surfing and on caring for patients with COVID-19. The best friend in Sheila Kelly’s poem encourages the main character to put on her old swimsuit when distressed. After a long series of days working with the hospitalist, I, too, wanted to offer solace. But instead, all I could offer was “Glad you’re okay,” a phrase that has reverberated through my brain ever since I first heard it myself.
Riding metaphorical surfboards together and finding ways to float in metaphorical swimming pools may not be the best solution to curb the emotional toll of the pandemic. However, validation and shared human connection serve as two ways to avoid possible drowning amidst the pandemic waves.
Mikayla Brockmeyer
Mikayla Brockmeyer is a first year osteopathic medical student at Des Moines University in Des Moines, Iowa. She began working as a hospitalist scribe in 2018, while she was enrolled in the Master of Science in Biomedical Sciences program at Des Moines University. She successfully defended her thesis in 2019 and spent her gap year scribing full time. This is her first time showcasing her storytelling abilities in a public arena. Her non-fiction essay “Turbulent Undertow” appears in the Fall 2020 Intima.