The Humanities as a Tool

Kayla Thomas, MS, RN

I am prepping a patient for surgery, and they have been waiting longer than they expected. They begin to pull off their leads and head toward the exit, but my colleague reminds them that they have an IV still in place and that they must return so we may remove it. They sit down and the colleague and I begin to investigate the root of the pending elopement. They are nervous about the procedure, and they have had ample time to run through all possible poor endings; a moment of reassurance and understanding from the people caring for them was what they needed to await the surgery. It would be easy to explain the behavior as rash if not for the moment of understanding that existed among the three of us; stepping into their experience allowed us to see what they experienced instead of as another patient with imprudent behavior. The nursing profession provides us with tangible skills and tools that afford us the opportunity to sit with someone in their darkest moments and allows us to see a person at their most vulnerable. Our current education and practices help us to see the patients we encounter as individuals to help, to provide care for, to give of ourselves to, and even to “other.” We may sit bedside, offer our hand of comfort, provide for the patient’s practical desires, and leave our work feeling satisfied. But how do these patients, these human beings, feel at the end of their encounters with us? Perhaps they feel that their needs were met, that we anticipated their basic requirements, and that we gave them the best of care we could with the busy schedules we are required to keep. But do they feel seen and genuinely cared for? In most settings, there may be great benefit in seeing our shared experiences from their perspective. Historically, there has always been more to nursing; always been a human connection aspect to this career we have chosen. Slowly the coasts of our care and humanity have been ebbed away by the tides of patient overload. The answer to this predicament we are in may just lie in the humanities. Humanities includes the study of the arts, culture, language, and societies; in other words, the things that truly make up each unique human, and humankind. Our very human experiences, when expanded past our box of medicine and patient care can nurture our overworked spirits and bring joy back into our careers.

Recognizing that the humanities may be a tool in understanding an individual’s perspective and experience, how do we cultivate introspection and cultural exposure in a career that demands so much of someone to begin with? How do we ask for more generosity of self from nurses, when we are faced with career lethargy and heavy work tasks?

Immersing students in the literature and focused discussions, Moyle and colleagues (1) noted their worldviews opened, and they were able to conjure more empathy for others and enlarge their appreciation for what it means to experience hurt and disease. Another strategy is contemplating the arts. While standing in front of a piece of art, we can try and understand the artist who painted it, we listen to a song and endeavor to feel what the artist went through to conjure up the lyrics, we read a new book and attempt to understand the character’s decisions, or we take an instant to understand why a patient may be nervous going into a procedure. This may be the first chisel in the walls we have built in our minds. Perhaps we may even go further to take up a new hobby, and as we catalyze the new experiences, we connect deeper to those whose own humanities encouraged us to develop ourselves further. Practicing these experiences, and wrestling with our ideas around them, may quite possibly be the practice that Moyle and colleagues found to be so helpful. My challenge to those perusing this commentary is to pull our minds out of the medical and patient care boxes we have constructed for ourselves. We may have the knowledge, we may know the differential diagnoses, and we undeniably know how to tangibly care for patients; however, to sit and soak up what we may learn from our patients, to absorb the beauty of a piece of art from the artist’s perspective, or to sit ourselves on the exam table and try to feel what it is a patient feels when they receive a terminal diagnosis – this is to live. This is to be human, to experience the humanities around us and expand our worlds a little more. Not just for the patients we encounter, but for ourselves, our families, and our short existence on this rotating orb. +

References

1. Moyle, W., Barnard, A., & Turner, C. (1995). The humanities and nursing: Using popular literature as a means of understanding human experience. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 21(5), 960–964. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2648.1995.21050960.x

Kayla Thomas, MS, RN is a Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner DNP Student at the Tan Chingfen Graduate School of Nursing, UMass Chan Medical School.