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A First Publication in an Academic Medical Journal

Last spring, before the grueling process of studying for the first part of the US medical licensing exam, I had the privilege to discuss literature and medicine with Abraham Verghese, one of the physicians and novelists I admire most in this world. Out of that discussion came an article that examined Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilych. It was accepted for publication in the Journal for General Internal Medicine and has recently been published online. As academia is like to do, the article is hidden behind a baffling number of electronic barriers. The only way I have found to reach it is through my university library portal. If I find a public link to the article, I will share it right away.

The inspiration for this post comes from a PubMed search result. PubMed is a search engine that scours several online databases for abstracts, citations, and articles on biomedical topics. When you enter my name into PubMed, it now produces a link to an article. It’s a wonderful feeling, very much like when I entered my name into the Amazon.com search bar and a novel popped up.

Stanford Medical School, as an institution, eats research for breakfast. As a result, I am pleasantly surrounded by classmates who qualify as stem cell ninjas, bioinformatics ninjas, bioengineering ninjas, statistical clinical research ninjas, and most other forms of research ninjutsu imaginable. So, this article is nothing to boast about. Likely most classmates would pat my shinny head with a sincere “that’s nice, dear,” comment. But nonetheless, I’m proud of the piece and hope it’s a sign that the dual career dream is actually coming into existence.

Here’s the article summary:

J Gen Intern Med. 2009 Dec 17. [Epub ahead of print]

Caring for Ivan Ilyich.

Charlton B, Verghese A.

Department of Internal Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, USA.

For over a century, Leo Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilych has been one of the most influential examinations of how we come to terms with our own mortality. Of the many who care for Ivan Ilych, only the uneducated peasant, Gerasim, is able to help him find meaning and resolution before death. An excerpt that describes Gerasim’s key interaction with Ivan Ilych is provided. Analysis of the text reveals how cultural values may hinder a patient’s ability to confront mortality and how unique social barriers inhibit different caretakers’ ability to care for a dying patient.

PMID: 20016955 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]