Health Humanities for Pre-Health Undergraduate Education

FAIN: AKA-285801-22

La Salle University (Philadelphia, PA 19141-1108)
Siobhan Conaty (Project Director: September 2021 to present)
Brian DeHaven (Co Project Director: May 2022 to July 2023)
Sean McClory (Co Project Director: July 2023 to present)

The development of a health humanities minor and a core curricular pathway to explore the relationships between health and the human condition. 

In 2020, the American Association of Medical Colleges published The Fundamental Role of Arts & Humanities in Medical Education providing guidelines for medical institutions to include the arts and humanities as a way of gaining essential and transferable skills in critical thinking, observation, social context, and emotional intelligence & empathy. Medical Schools are looking for applicants who have UG Health Humanities experience, and as a result, baccalaureate Health Humanities programs in the US & Canada have exploded over the last 20 years. See Case Western School of Medicine's study; Health Humanities Baccalaureate Programs in the US & Canada (2021). We believe the Pre-Health Professional Program at La Salle would benefit from a minor or core concentration in Health Humanities. We plan to draw on existing faculty strengths to create an interdisciplinary, dynamic, and experiential curricular path for our students to better prepare them to meet the needs of future employers