The Powerful Connection Between Art and Medical Education

For medical professionals, the difference between looking at a patient and truly seeing them can save a life. Observation is one of the vital skills that Alice L. Walton School of Medicine is teaching students through its medical degree program, which enhances allopathic medical education through the arts, humanities, and whole health principles.

The arts and humanities are integrated into the curriculum through the Art of Healing, a four-year longitudinal course. In this course, students develop observation, communication, critical thinking, and other skills through engagement in the arts, including the visual arts, theatre, creative writing, music, and film.

Art Meets Medicine

AWSOM Founder Alice Walton’s inspiration for the School came from her own health care journey. While undergoing medical treatment, she found painting with watercolors and reading art books helped her recovery. Based on this experience, she saw a way to improve health care by training doctors in a whole-person approach to care infused with the arts.

The connection between art and medicine is well researched. A 2019 report by the World Health Organization gathered more than 3,000 studies from across the globe that demonstrate the positive impact of the arts on treatment outcomes, preventative care, promotion of healthy behaviors, and even the well-being of health care providers.

In 2020, the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) published “The Fundamental Role of Arts and Humanities in Medical Education”, a review of more than 700 works on the results of integrating art into medical education programs.

The report found that educational methods such as art observation and narrative medicine “can address many 21st century health care challenges” and noted benefits such as fostering collaboration, driving change and innovation, and supporting the well-being and resilience of learners.

A Campus Infused with Art

AWSOM students do not have to travel far to experience the arts as part of their education. The School shares a campus with the renowned Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and the institutions have partnered together to offer students educational sessions in the museum’s expansive gallery spaces.

Daedelus Hoffman, MA, Director of Arts in Medicine and Wellbeing at Crystal Bridges, leads the coordination and collaboration for student art experiences at Crystal Bridges and the Momentary.

“Our partnership with AWSOM is about creating truly novel learning experiences that intertwine art, medicine, and whole-person care,” said Hoffman. “By engaging students directly with artists, curators, and works of art in our galleries, we are helping them strengthen skills that will shape their future practice as physicians.”

On their first day of class, AWSOM students explored Crystal Bridges and learned about personal and professional identity through contour drawing at Rashid Johnson’s “The Bruising,” collective poetry composition at Nari Ward’s “We the People (black version),” and active discussions of symbols and self in Kehinde Wiley’s “Portrait of a Florentine Nobleman” and Frank Big Bear’s “The Poetry of Joseph E Big Bear.”

In addition to visual arts sessions like these, AWSOM students will build listening and communication skills through acting and improvisation exercises facilitated by professionals from the award-winning local theater, TheatreSquared.

AWSOM’s intention to incorporate the arts into medical education goes beyond the classroom and into the design of its medical education facility, which features a gallery, on-campus art installations, and inspiring natural spaces to provide a supportive and inspiring learning environment. AWSOM’s first gallery exhibition, “Good Medicine,” was acquired by Art Bridges Foundation for the School and features Indigenous artworks highlighting the healing power of art and community.

Through collaborations with Crystal Bridges and other partners, the School of Medicine continues to explore the rich connections between art and well-being as a cornerstone of its goal to train the physicians of the future.