As part of my research into how comics can work as educational tools for post-secondary education, late last year I put together a comic book-style handbook for new doctors starting their internship at Mackay Base Hospital in Queensland.
Interns are a great group to focus on, since they occupy a liminal space where they no longer students, but not yet professionals. Part of their “job” is to learn, and there are scheduled teaching sessions built into the internships curriculum, but most of their learning comes from their experiences working on the frontlines of the hospital.
Transitioning from student to professional
Internship is essentially a year-long transition from student to professional, and it comes with its share of challenges. Intern medical education curriculums help provide interns practical and theoretical knowledge, and many of these programs are excellent. However, there are other aspects of being a doctor that intern training programs don’t always address.
A recent study by Beyond Blue shows that young doctors report much higher levels of burn-out, cynicism and mental health problems than their older colleagues. This suggests that hospitals may be strapped for the time and resources to address the emotional and interpersonal challenges of being a new doctor.
The staff of the Medical Education Unit at Mackay Base Hospital saw a comic book as a potentially high-quality/low-cost way to delve into these personal and interpersonal challenges. Their input, as well as that of many young doctors, formed the basis of the curriculum that I developed for the Intern Comic Book Handbook.
Read the comic for yourself!
In the coming days and weeks, I will discuss the decisions and processes that went into each page in the comic. In the meantime, though, here is the comic itself! Click below to make it large, and have a flip through.
I’d love to hear what you think about this comic, and your feedback on how comics might work in medical education or other fields of teaching and learning. I’ll be back with more soon!