Illness Performed and Imagined: An elective course using Humanities to teach student pharmacists about illness

Abstract Objective To describe an elective course featuring the use of the Humanities to provide students with an understanding of the illness experiences people face from their health problems and as they are distinct from disease processes. Methods The course was delivered mostly through online media and online class chat sessions as well as asynchronous discussions. In between these sessions, students studied assigned Humanities works in literature, film, drama, and television. Students were evaluated and assessed through class discussion, written papers, discussion board contributions, and final projects. Student surveys were administered to assess specific aspects of the course. Results The course was well received and considered highly valuable by both students and college faculty as discerned from student and faculty surveys as well as other mechanisms available for input from students. Discussion Pharmacy education puts an understandable emphasis on the pathophysiological basis of disease and on the pharmacological basis of treatment. As a result, students focus most of their attention on biomedical elements of health problems while giving little attention to the illness experiences people face. Our course aims to give students a way to give more attention to the illness experience, and the course draws from the Humanities for this content. The positive response from students and faculty suggest that providing more education about the illness experience through the use of Humanities could be effective in producing more empathetic and caring pharmacists.