A Call for a New Ism in Pharmacy

Recently at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE), the sculptured art displayed on our grounds had the word “ISM” on display. This art form got us reflecting on what it meant, especially in the world of pharmacy. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines “ism” as a distinctive doctrine or theory.¹ In 2015, Merriam-Webster Dictionary declared it as the Word of the Year. The word is often used in philosophy to define specific ideologies and has been used to denote radical social reform movements. In reflecting, it was hard to identify isms that have resulted in radical social reform movements for pharmacy education. With the new ACPE accreditation standards and the increased emphasis on developing the affective domain of the profession, the time is right for a new movement.²

During the past two years in the twilight of our academic careers in pharmacy, we have become passionate about the need to enhance the human side and specifically, the humanities, in our preparation of future pharmacists. We have been honored to be asked to develop a health humanities course in the honors program at SIUE.³ This experience has helped us to use the humanities to develop the personal skills needed for health care professional training that results in individuals who are open-minded, flexible, and inclusive in their approach to patient care. In the course, students complete assignments that develop self-awareness, ability to relate to others, professionalism and ethical decision making, communication and building empathy.³ Topics such as biases and stigmatization toward HIV/AIDS, mental illness, addiction, and gender reassignments, access to care, portrayal of health care providers, health care ethics, patient experiences with cancer and Alzheimer’s, aging, and death and dying are explored using a variety of media such as books, short stories, films, podcasts and blogs, poems, photography and other forms of art. Amy Haddad’s poem, “Second Degree Block,” reaffirms the need to enhance the human dimensions of health professional training.⁴ In her commentary for the poem, Haddad expresses regret, when as a young nurse, she focused strictly on the technical side of caring for a patient as opposed to making a genuine human connection to the dying patient’s needs. In another assignment, students were asked to examine a patient experience by comparing two accounts of a breast cancer patient experience with side effects. In the first account was a technical view of chemotherapy side effect as reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. In comparison, the second account was a poem by Julia Darling: “Chemotherapy,” from her book, Sudden Collapses in Public Places, which describes how the patient feels about experiencing chemotherapy side effects.⁵ It was clear that using poetry to describe patient experience resulted in enhanced empathy and ability to relate to the patient.

Our experiences teaching the health humanities course has motivated us to enhance the use of the humanities in our curriculum and thus create a “neo-humanism” that acts as a philosophical and ethical stance to emphasize the value of human beings. This movement would encourage thought or action in which human interests, values, and dignity predominate.¹ The new ism, neo-humanism, should not be confused with the areas of philosophy that align humanism with secularism and a non-theistic life view. Rather we are calling for this new ism in pharmacy education that will enhance the compassionate and caring dimensions by emphasizing appreciation for the humanities as our students develop as health care practioners. We believe that the humanities can develop students to be more empathetic. At the 2016 APhA meeting, Abraham Verghese, author of Cutting for Stone, spoke about the power of touch in enhancing patient-provider relationship.⁶ He highlighted that pharmacy is a profession that has at its core a human relationship. Thus what better time to call for the new ism of “neo-humanism” to create a social reform movement in pharmacy education.