A doctor-poet
Ozge Tuncalp catches up with Michael
Berman, clinical professor of obstetrics
and gynaecology at Yale School of Medicine, where he also serves as
the president of Yale New Haven Physician Hospital Organization.
His special interest in pregnancy loss, strong commitment in making
humanism a priority in healthcare services, and his gift in
expressing himself through poetry led to the foundation of Hygeia
(www.hygeia.org), a comprehensive platform for families and
healthcare professionals, including medical students, to share and
learn from one another. What started as a website in 1995 has now
exploded into a full blown foundation with programmes like the
Ephemeris Project
How did you decide to go into medicine and
then obstetrics and gynaecology?
From my earliest recollections, I was
interested in both science and the prospect of helping others.
Coupled with role models from my own doctors, my career goal became
focused on being a physician. I have always taken a philosophical
view of medicine as a career, and early on in medical school I
thought I would become a paediatrician, as this would allow me to
affect the health, hopes, and future of children early in their
lives. Towards the end of my medical school education, however, I
was once more influenced by several unparallel role models who were
obstetricians, and they in turn influenced my decision to become an
obstetrician. This field of medicine satisfies all the reasons for
which I became a doctor, including the most intangible—the
philosophical fulfilment to strive to affect and improve the life
of another before birth.
What is Hygeia? Could you tell us the story
behind it?
In an effort to console my patients at a most
tragic and vulnerable time in their lives—the death of their
child—I began to write poems for them. I sent these poems to
them and read them at funerals and memorial services. When I
realised that these personal expressions were helpful, I prepared
to publish a book of poetry. At first this was not accepted for
publication, and so I learnt the programming language of the
internet, and in 1995 I created a website. I called the programme
Hygeia after the Greek goddess of health and healing.
What have the reactions been like since the
programme was founded in 1995?
I am somewhat partial as I have put in
countless hours and passion into its development and evolution and
continue to do so. It is my obsession. I believe it has been a
successful programme and has generated hope and comfort for its
users. It has given me the opportunity to travel and disseminate
its content and meaning, worldwide.
What are the obstacles and rewards of starting
an innovative programme like Hygeia?
There have been few obstacles and innumerable
rewards. The greatest obstacle has been marketing the programme and
disseminating its realised value to the underserved populations of
the world.
The rewards have come from the recognition that
this unique programme, which I created and nurtured, has affected
thousands of families internationally. The programme has been
online for 10 years, and I have learnt of hundreds of children who
have been born healthy after their siblings had died. There is no
greater reward than this.
One of the projects within Hygeia is the
Ephemeris Project. Could you tell us more about it?
Ephemeris means a diary or journal in Latin.
The Ephemeris Project (http://ephemerisproject.com) is a programme
to promote and provide a venue of introspection and self expression
among medical students, physicians, and other healthcare
professionals to help them to participate in effective and
compassionate care of their patients. This arises from one of the
things that I’ve done for myself that has really helped me to
get a handle on my emotions and get in touch with what I’m
really doing as a physician: writing down my thoughts in the form
of poetry. Thinking about our feelings as professionals caring for
a patient experiencing a loss or other catastrophic medical event
in a clinical setting is important and elevates our role as
physicians and indeed the entire experience, rather than seeing it
as a clinical procedure. Most students use computers and the
internet, and these tools can provide a great opportunity to
document feelings and share them anonymously.
The goal of the Ephemeris Project is to create
a platform and database of doctors and students to help them
privately journal their feelings as they care for patients, tell
and share their stories with other health professionals, have this
monitored through a mentoring programme and have it all online.
How do you think medical students around the
world can contribute?
Medical students in the 21st century are being
educated at the cusp of technological and biomedical advances. It
is my hope that the students—from all countries and
cultures—will always appreciate the privilege of caring.
In your career, you’ve been an
inspirational figure for medical students with your humanism and
enthusiasm for the field. What would you recommend to medical
students for their future careers in an era of less compassionate,
more mechanistic approach?
I believe that it’s a privilege to be a
doctor and to care for patients and be in their intimate lives as
human beings. We can listen to their stories and take care of their
illnesses in a way that no other profession can. I think by
becoming more introspective and perhaps a little more deeply
involved in what we are doing, our compassion will become evident
and patients will benefit. Technology provides better diagnostic
and therapeutic medical care, but as more technology is developed
and utilised, doctors may become more reliant on that technology
and less on their interpersonal skills. No matter what is going on
with our patients and what technology we use to help them, when the
technology fails, the physician should not. Physicians will have to
learn the old art of medicine of listening and talking to patients,
holding hands, being at their bed side, complementing the use of
technology and advanced science. This is the reason for Hygeia and
my work.
please note that studentBMJ cannot offer to
consider or to publish any poems
Ozge Tuncalp, postdoctoral
fellow, Yale School of Medicine
Email: ozge.tuncalp@yale.edu
studentBMJ 2005;13:441-484 December ISSN 0966-6494
