| This information is provided by the Wit Film Project. For more information please contact Jennifer Spooner at jennifer.spooner@med.va.gov or 310-478-3711 ext. 48353. |
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Physicians in training have an urgent need to acquire skills necessary to care for an aging generation of Americans, and progressive medical educators have initiated a range of efforts to address the inadequacy of training in end-of-life care. In addition to technical skills (e.g., symptom management), caring for dying persons requires humanistic skills not easily taught by traditional educational methods. Furthermore, caring for dying persons evokes powerful emotions that are often experienced by trainees but rarely acknowledged or discussed in medical training. Emotive educational methods such as film offer a chance to explicitly discuss trainees emotional responses to caring for seriously ill persons, and the psychological realism of such methods invites learner self reflection on care-giving practices that may foster better physician practice.
"We are discussing life and death, and not in the abstract, either; we are discussing my life and my death."
-- Vivian Bearing, "Wit" |
We developed an innovative program with the support of the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation to utilize "Wit" to train medical students, residents, and staff providers in the humanistic elements of end-of-life care. The Pulitzer Prize winning play "Wit" relates the personal story of a professor of English literature dying from metastatic ovarian cancer and describes the protagonist's experience with medical care from diagnosis to death. "Wit" was one of the most successful commercial stage productions in North America during the 1999-2000 theatre season. The "Wit" Educational Initiative invited medical students and residents at 32 sites in the United States and Canada to experience the live theatre version of "Wit" on site at hospitals and medical schools to promote learner empathy and self-reflection in the care of dying persons.
Post-performance survey data showed high praise for the educational programs. Eighty-eight percent of trainees reported they were emotionally moved "a great deal" or "pretty much" by the performance, while 94 percent reported the play portrayed the emotions of dying patients in an "entirely real" or "very real" manner. Eighty-seven percent rated the program as better than didactic lectures, 89% rated it better than journal article readings, and 68% rated it better than bedside rounds.
In an effort to make the experience of "Wit" widely accessible to medical trainees, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation with the support of HBO is enabling the "Wit" Film Project to make the film version of "Wit" available to medical schools throughout the United States. This 90-minute film is easily incorporated into educational curricula either by integrating it in existing courses (e.g. ethics, introduction to clinical medicine), or as a stand-alone experience. At no charge, the "Wit" Film Project will distribute the film version of "Wit" along with educational materials developed in the course of our project’s prior experience using "Wit." In return, we require participating institutions to complete a survey to help us evaluate and improve the usefulness of our educational materials..
| This information is provided by the Wit Film Project. For more information please contact Jennifer Spooner at jennifer.spooner@med.va.gov or 310-478-3711 ext. 48353. |
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