Description:

The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities & Bioethics

presents

A Montgomery Lecture

With

Katie Watson, JD
Associate Professor of Medical Social Sciences, Medical Education,
and Obstetrics & Gynecology
Faculty, Medical Humanities & Bioethics Graduate Program
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

Contextualizing Roe v Wade:
Morality Laws and the Legal Personhood of Women

In honor of the 47th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe v Wade decision (Jan 22, 1973) and the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing women the right to vote, Professor Watson will contextualize restrictions on women’s access to the medical procedure of abortion within a larger arc of constitutional law around “morality legislation” and the legal status of women generally, and she will conclude with a look toward the future of abortion access in the United States.

Description:

The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities & Bioethics

presents

A Montgomery Lecture

With

Tom Buller
Professor of Philosophy
Illinois State University
Normal, Illinois

Brain-Computer Interfaces and Prosthetic Agents

BCIs have been described as devices that “translate thought into action.”  This description seems appropriate since BCIs decode neural signals to extract voluntary motor commands that reflect the person’s movement intentions, and then use the processed signal to control an external device or limb.  In broad terms, we can say that a person has performed an action if bodily movement is caused by the person’s beliefs and desires and is under the person’s control.  An important question to ask is whether BCI-mediated behavior meets these conditions.  

Description:

The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities & Bioethics

presents

A Montgomery Lecture

With

Riva Lehrer
Artist – Writer – Curator                     
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Faculty
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Instructor

Golem Girl, A Memoir 

Children with congenital impairments often spend months to years in the hospital. A medical childhood may set them apart from their peers; it may form their ideas about family, friendship, trust, safety, and hope. For this lecture, Riva Lehrer will read from Golem Girl, show images of her portraiture, and discuss her own journey from stigmatized child to passionate chronicler of non-normative beauty.

Description:

The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities & Bioethics

presents

A Montgomery Lecture

With

Louise P. King, MD, JD, FACOG
Assistant Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Biology
Harvard Medical School
Surgeon, Division of Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Should Clinicians Set Limits on Reproductive Autonomy? 

Learning Objectives:

1.      Explain both the history and current conceptualization of autonomy in medicine

2.      Define professional autonomy in the setting of clinic decision making

3.      Understand how shared decision making may require a balance between individual and professional autonomy

Description:

The Master of Arts in Medical Humanities & Bioethics

presents

A Montgomery Lecture

With

Laura E. Hirshfield, PhD
Assistant Professor of Medical Education & Sociology
University of Illinois at Chicago 

Making the Subjective, Objective?: Examining Standardized Patients’ Decision-Making and Assessment of Medical Trainees’ Communication Skills

Standardized and simulated patients (SPs) are frequently used to teach medical communication. One key aspect of SPs’ work is the use of checklists and rating scales to provide a standardized format for evaluating medical trainees’ performances. While numerous studies have been conducted to validate the use of SPs, little is known about how SPs make decisions about how to rate trainees’ performances. This is of particular interest given that certain aspects of medical communication, such as displaying empathy, rely upon subjective feelings experienced by the SPs. We draw on data from qualitative interviews with 27 SPs employed at a large, Midwestern medical school in the U.S. to ask, “how do SPs maintain standardized forms of evaluation and assessment?”  Though our participants highlighted the rigorous training they received and the standardization of the checklists they used, they also acknowledged the subjective nature of their work. Three main themes emerged: 1) interactional dynamics which cannot be named; 2) the interjection of "gut feelings" in the assessment of interactions and 3) how personal reactions and feelings must be tabled to "fairly" assess students. Our findings highlight the strategies and techniques utilized by SPs as they worked to transform their subjective assessments into objective evaluations in line with the values of standardized medical science and training. We argue that SPs perform underexplored forms of emotional labor in order to create or produce standardization in these types of educational encounters.