Comics Offer Unique Insight Into Health Care for Patients, Caregivers

By Susan Van Dusen

Participants in the graphic medicine workshop complete one of the exercises let by nurse and artist MK Czerweic, R.N.

Participants in the graphic medicine workshop complete one of the exercises let by nurse and artist MK Czerweic, R.N.

“Graphic Medicine: How Comics can Improve our Health” offered the chance for students, faculty and staff members to draw and write about clinical experiences and their personal journey in the health care field. Each participant was equipped with blank paper and a small pack of crayons courtesy of the UAMS Office of Interprofessional Education and proceeded to follow Czerwiec’s instructions for activities that included drawing a self-portrait, writing text for a page-long comic and illustrating a clinical encounter.

Known as graphic medicine, the use of comics in and about health care has exploded in the past several years and includes everything from patient instructional material to numerous books focused on personal journeys through illness.

Czerwiec’s visit to Little Rock was sponsored and organized by the Department of Medical Humanities and Bioethics in the College of Medicine.

“I use comics to contemplate the complexities of illness, medicine and decision making,” said Czerwiec, who has written under the pseudonym Comic Nurse since 2000. Her most recent book titled “Taking Turns: Stories from HIV/AIDS Care Unit 371” details her work with HIV/AIDS patients at the height of the epidemic and was named 2017 Best of Graphic Medicine by the Journal of the American Medical Association.

MK Czerweic, R.N., shares how comics are a valuable storytelling tool for patients, family members and health care professionals.

MK Czerweic, R.N., shares how comics are a valuable storytelling tool for patients, family members and health care professionals.

Czerwiec’s workshop at UAMS was part of a multi-event visit that included a lecture on graphic medicine and its implications for health care and presentations to medical students and faculty. She also participated in the Arkansas Literary Festival, which UAMS sponsored.

She serves as artist-in-residence at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago and senior fellow of the George Washington School of Nursing Center for Health Policy and Media Engagement in Washington, D.C.

“I want people to become aware of the field of graphic medicine and to understand that comics can enhance the health care experience for both patients and caregivers,” said Leah Eisenberg, assistant professor in the Department of Medical Humanities and Bioethics. Eisenberg became acquainted with Czerwiec at a graphic medicine conference about five years ago and worked with organizers of the Arkansas Literary Festival to bring her to Arkansas for the round of events.

“Comics can provide a window into the lived experience of illness,” Czerwiec said, adding that she had no previous art experience before drawing her first comic, which was a simplistic self-portrait with the words, “I am miserable.” From that moment, Czerwiec said she went from despair and confusion to clarity by finding a tangible way to express the intense emotions she experienced as a nurse on a day-to-day basis.

Leah Eisenberg, assistant professor in the Department of Medical Humanities and Bioethics, shows participants a copy of a new book by MK Czerwiec, R.N.

Czerwiec told participants at both events that reading and creating graphic medicine has many benefits for health care professionals, patients and loved ones. It can provide a mechanism for instructional material that is understood across language barriers and literacy levels, as well as simplifying complex information that can be easily understood in high-stress situations.

Comics also allow the artist to share both what the characters are saying, through the use of speech bubbles, and what they are thinking, through the use of thought bubbles. This unique combination of thoughts and words offers insight into the mindset of family members who provide care for their ill loved ones, patients who struggle with processing their own medical conditions, or health care professionals and students who deal regularly with high-stress situations.

“Comics tell stories in a different way than traditional text on a page and give us an insight into a wide range of emotions,” Eisenberg said.

Co-sponsor for Czerwiec’s lecture and workshop were the UAMS College of Nursing and UAMS College of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine and Division of Palliative Medicine. The UAMS Office of Interprofessional Education provided additional support and continuing education credits for student and faculty participants.