Intima Archives | NON-FICTION - M-Z by title
Machinery | Sean Murphy | SPRING 2017
When confronted with a loved one's cancer, we find ourselves (and our bodies) reacting in unpredictable ways.
March Manic | Lisa Jacobs | SPRING 2019
The frenzy of Spring brings out frazzled late night decision-making in the Psychiatric emergency room.
Mea Culpa | Ron Lands | SPRING 2023
Looking closely at a patient changes everything.
Medical Maze | Josephine Ensign | SPRING 2016
The physical sense of a hospital space impacts the experience of the patient and the practitioner.
Medicine Versus Surgery | Khanjan Shah | SPRING 2014
A medical resident reflects on the rivalry between medicine and surgery and the necessity for communication between healers.
Mena and Natalie | Melissa Franckowiak | FALL 2018
Friendship between caregiver and child challenges a nanny’s maternal instincts when illness arises.
The Memory Tree | Indu Voruganti | Spring 2014
A reflection on a creative expression workshop for individuals with early Alzheimer's and memory loss examines what it means to be a remembering being.
Mercies: Or, the Mostly True Tale of a Narratively-Assisted Death | Paula Holmes-Rodman
“What is the last story you would want to hear? And what if you could choose the teller and the tale?”
Miss July | Laurie Gunst | FALL 2012
As a woman grows older, she struggles to accept her changing body in a society that stigmatizes aging.
The Moral Matrix of Wartime Medicine | Jeffrey Brown | FALL 2015
A doctor in Vietnam makes choices rooted in humanity, instinct, and survival.
Morning Light | Dianne Avey | SPRING 2023
Even ten years later, the loss of a loved one feels like the present.
Ms. Johnson | Monique Hedmann | FALL 2012
As a woman ages, her stories remain as relevant as ever—especially for one who really listens.
My Biggest Mistake | Cormac Duff | SPRING 2023
When a potentially life-changing error is made, facing up to it becomes the only option.
My Father's Doctor | Jennifer Chianese | SPRING 2016
A father, a daughter, a doctor and the roller-coaster that is life.
My Mudflats | Patricia Brenneman | FALL 2017
An unusual metaphor adds to language to the struggle with illness.
The Myth of the White Coat | Allison Larson | SPRING 2016
The white coat offers no guarantees, and no protection.
My Eyes are a Map of Veins | Jacqueline Ellis | SPRING 2022
Other people’s responses lend empathy and insight to this piece about an unusual condition.
My First Patient | Casey Means | FALL 2013
A difficult patient proves to be the best teacher: A medical student finds connection and meaning.
My Heart is In My Hands | Karen Jahn | SPRING 2015
A breathless patient and her cardiologist search for the language to reframe a complex medical history.
Narrative Mindfulness | Charles Paccione | FALL 2015
Through listening and attentiveness, a mental health provider advocates for improved communication.
Never Tell a Truth | Douglas Krohn | FALL 2020
How does a physician share news that will devastate a loved one?
Night River | Daniel Shalev | FALL 2015
How can I give that up? Becoming yourself by making choices, even while dying.
Night Trip | Michael Geisser | FALL 2015
A writer with motor neuron disease reflects on his life and embodiment during an early morning trip to the bathroom.
No One Gets Out Alive Anyway | Ellen Holtzman | SPRING 2017
A patient awaits a possible terminal diagnosis. This is her mantra.
No Pain No Gain | Anna Reid | FALL 2017
A challenging workout pushes a patient to her edge.
The Note | Elizabeth Titus | SPRING 2013
A wife reflects on a note left by her husband's radiologist, and the complexities of end of life care.
Numb | Nikhil Barot | SPRING 2019
A physician navigates the concepts of feeling and pain in trying to care for a cancer patient.
Of Birds and Mice | Nancy Stephan | SPRING 2013
A woman gains a new understanding of her young self when her cousin, inspired by his backyard denizens, broaches a long-buried subject.
On Call | Lainie Holman | FALL 2012
For an intern in a pediatric hospital, life and death are all in a day’s work
On Call | Sneha Mantri | FALL 2011
In the Cardiac Critical Care unit, a doctor has a first real life experience with CPR.
On Elevators | Tarina Quraishi | SPRING 2015
A hospital volunteer reflects on how care and human connection are revealed on elevators.
On Perseus’s Wings | Therese Wolfe | SPRING 2022
Aging and illness progression are relieved through literature, memory, and a return to a favorite place.
On Schedule | Kate Swenson | FALL 2015
A girl grows, within her own time, to love the woman she is.
Open Heart, Open Book | Jennifer Stella | SPRING 2014
What's it like to scrub in on a case during cardiothoracic service? A doctor describes the revelations.
Over the Summer | Julia Hyman | SPRING 2013
During a break from college, a pre-med student learns what it's like to work at a teaching hospital.
Outside the Lines | Audrey Ferber | SPRING 2021
A loving wife reflects on her husband—and on all that has been lost and what still remains.
Paint Blistered Doll | Thomas Gibbs | FALL 2013
A story told by a physician to his patient has a radioactive intensity.
Pandora's Box | Candice Carnes | FALL 2013
How do you talk about an affliction that everyone—doctors, friends, yourself—says doesn't exist?
Patriotism, Tissue Paper, and Showers | Jeff Shearl | SPRING 2017
It helps to have a sense of humor when your illness is no laughing matter.
Performing my First Caesarean: A Reflection on the Intersection of Dance and Surgery | Shilpa Darivemula and Roshni Prakash | FALL 2020
Come dance with us: Lessons taught in the operating room parallel the awareness a dancer learns when trained in Kuchipudi, one of the classical dance forms of India.
Personal Effects | Kerry Leddy | SPRING 2019
A grieving mother tries to understand her daughter through the items she left behind.
The Personal is the Pastoral | Betty Morningstar | FALL 2021
With unfinished business at the end of life, a woman turns to friends to ease her final passage.
Physician as Enabler | Vik Reddy | SPRING 2016
A surgeon reflects on the unintentional error of his ways.
Plague Season: A Memoir | Eileen Valinoti | FALL 2017
Be transported back in time with imagery of the iron lung and strict conduct codes for nurses.
Polychroma | Justin Millan | SPRING 2020
Illness comes in many colors.
The Power of a Handshake | Hugh Silk | SPRING 2015
Fist bump or strong grip? A doctor considers how a greeting may change a clinical encounter.
Precipice | Kelly Garriott Waite | SPRING 2016
Many challenges confront a patient, who experiences the anxiety of simultaneously confronting possible illness and navigating a procedure-focused healthcare system.
Premies | John Graham-Pole | SPRING 2016
Newborns, the most vulnerable being premature twins, generate a meditation about surviving the odds.
The Pre-Op Interview | Kieran Shamash | SPRING 2023
Communication is much more the sum of words.
The Pull of Gravity | Janet Cincotta | FALL 2017
One bacterium, two siblings, and two intertwining histories of healing.
The Push | Sheila Ojeaburu | SPRING 2021
Reaching out with empathy, a clinician persuades a young mother to reconsider a life-and-death decision.
The Quixotic Pursuit of Quality | Dean Schillinger | FALL 2015
A physician and patient reconcile their divergent views on the meaning of quality in healthcare.
Range of Vision | Catherine Klatzker | FALL 2013
A couple finds out their baby has persistent hyperplastic primary vitreous (PHPV) in her left eye and takes steps to handle the challenge—for their daughter and themselves.
Reap What We Sow | Janice Anderson | FALL 2016
A difficult birth helps a practitioner address tensions among the medical team and within herself.
Red Line Rising | Michael Brown | SPRING 2018
You might call it a vision quest: How treating a homeless man's eye injury brings more than just the clinical procedure into focus.
Remembrance | Jennifer Li | FALL 2022
Of wasp bites and honoring ancestors: A resident’s own experiences of loss help her bring comfort to a patient.
Starting Out | JP Sutherland | FALL 2022
On call, a psychiatric resident meets a new mother with post-partum psychosis and deepens his practice during her slow and steady treatment.
Request for a Search and Seizure Warrant in the Matter of Mr. Richard W. Shepard’s Remains | Nels Highberg | FALL 2018
A professor searches among fragments of his past for closure never afforded by a friend’s illness and ultimate demise.
Resisting Breast Cancer Culture: Two Stories | Judith Cohen and Sarah Sutro | SPRING 2014
Two women, an artist and a writer, document their experiences without sentimentality and talk about why they don't use the term "survivor."
Resisting the Vortex: Thoughts on Narrative Medicine and Dying Well | Rebecca A. McAteer | FALL 2013
A doctor herself, the daughter of a doctor considers her own attitudes about end of life care as she reflects back on her mother's death.
Retrospection Series | Joseph Burns | FALL 2019
A resident reflects on learning through experience and sharing that with other doctors.
Room 427 | Zainab Mabizari | SPRING 2019
An emotionally engaging portrayal of a daughter’s attempt to understand her father’s gradual death.
Rounds | Susan Ito | FALL 2015
A return to Alta Bates Hospital triggers memories of pivotal moments in the life of a physical therapist.
Schmeckle Down | Kenneth Weinberg | FALL 2020
An unobserved holiday sets the stage for a remarkable encounter.
See No Evil | Gillian Pidcock | SPRING 2013
What do you do when a parent isn't interested in the push toward health?
See One, Do One, Teach One | Lauren Gambill | SPRING 2017
Reflections on a simple, yet old-fashioned educational principle for becoming a physician.
Sensory Processing Disorder | Minna Dubin | FALL 2019
A mother tells her child what she wishes she could do for them.
The Shape of the Shore | Rana Awdish | FALL 2020
When certainty and safety feel so far away, leaning on one another may make the journey feel possible.
Sick, Lonely, Brave | Rachel Tanner | SPRING 2014
Dealing with illness is one of the loneliest battles you can face, but you are not alone.
Sisters Lost | Kat McNichol | SPRING 2021
It isn’t always possible to negotiate deep familial ties, when a woman feels the absence of a sibling who is right in front of her.
The Skull on My Desk | Allison Rosenbaum | SPRING 2021
Anatomy lab is one of many things lost during pandemic-era medical school.
Sleep to Dream | Jackie Mantey | SPRING 2021
Narcolepsy is more than tired—“Fatigue felt like dipping in and out of a drowning state, and sleep felt like succumbing to the water” —and a diagnosis is the key to moving forward.
Soft Side Of The Tiger | Cheryl Shore | SPRING 2017
A mysterious memory changes a woman's life as she unravels her past.
Some Body | PK Kennedy | FALL 2021
Patience isn’t always easy when there is a painful path toward an elusive diagnosis.
Some Cream With My Cholesterol | Steven Lewis | SPRING 2016
Non-compliance: the word is profoundly close to "nonsense" in the dictionary and sometimes a bit of irreverence is the best medicine.
Spa Day | Gwendolyn Harwood | SPRING 2023
A moment of acceptance brings joy to a difficult situation.
Spice | Mark Tan | SPRING 2021
Echoes of Frank Herbert’s “Dune” frames this harrowing account of a man who ends up in a “state beyond sleep and death.”
Stepping Up | Robin Kemper | SPRING 2023
Sisyphus lives in this trip up the stairs.
Stuck Between Floors | Katherine White | SPRING 2022
Knowledge of a diagnosis and the success of treatment are not always enough to ward off anxiety.
Sulieman | Tim Cunningham | FALL 2019
Ebola, Sierra Leone, and the unsung heroes of daily life.
The Sunshine Chairs | Tim Cunningham | FALL 2015
An ebola stricken child teaches a nurse to see the light in dark places.
Taking Off the Gloves | Lane Robson | SPRING 2021
“Tears flow and flow and flow”: the story of a physician caring for a young child in Sierra Leone with serious pneumonia as rain floods the roads outside.
Tale of the Crying Girl Who Never Cries | Barbara Baglietto | FALL 2014
We pride ourselves on controlling our emotions, but what price do we pay when we do that? A clinician recounts a story that enlightens and instructs.
Thank You, Creedence | Sarah Birnbach | FALL 2021
Music turns a scary surgical procedure into a soul-satisfying adventure
There Will Be No Problems | Tony Guerra | SPRING 2014
Three tiny lives to welcome into the world: A parent of triplets finds comfort in a doctor's statement.
Things I Learned From Pole Dancing That I Did Not Learn From Residency | Elise Mullan | FALL 2022
The grind of residency leads to a creative way of stress-reduction.
This Blurry Place of Better | Sarah Cymrot | SPRING 2023
After a stroke, the relief in recovery often comes in waves, receding as often as the tide.
This Story | Melissa Rosato | FALL 2016
Her last patient of the day becomes a memory that keeps her rethinking the narrative.
3:43 AM | Sunidhi Ramesh | FALL 2020
Seeing how tenuous life is in the middle of the night is a wake-up call for a medical student on the labor and delivery service.
Three Moments in a Trainee's Training | Snow Wangding | FALL 2022
Inexperience allows a young doctor the chance to question everything—herself and her patients, especially the ones lost and never really known.
The Thunderstorm That Saved My Life | Vanessa Garza
Rare neurovascular malformation (brain AVM) is not an easy diagnosis to process—for patient and spouse—as this honest and loving essay reveals.
Tidepools | Jennifer Tsai | FALL 2016
Opening the body during surgery opens unusual associations.
To Melinda | Priscilla Mainardi | FALL 2020
The loss of a neighbor during the COVID-19 spring brings back memories—of get-togethers, coincidental connections and a constellation of emotions.
To Shred, Or Not | Timothy Brennan | FALL 2013
What is a physician to do when caught between the competing values of confidentiality and the life of a patient? A specialist in addiction medicine struggles with this quandary.
Touch: A Surgery Rotation | Claire Unis | SPRING 2021
Swing dancing provides solace for a medical student who finds she is losing herself in the de-humanization of “abscess service.”
Try To Turn a Cowboy Vegan | Towela King | SPRING 2023
A nonbinary medical student gives care to a cowboy and confronts prejudice within.
Turbulent Undertow | Mikayla Brockmeyer | FALL 2020
Metaphorical approach to the waves we ride in life; literally.
The Turkish Student | Heba Haleem | SPRING 2022
Simple acts of kindness find a way to bring a baby into the world in a Syrian refugee camp.
Two Minutes | Tim Cunningham | FALL 2016
The meaning of the moment, minute, hour on the life and death of a young boy and his nurse.
Under the Wreckage, An Ocean | M. Sophia Newman | FALL 2018
Making sense of trauma through dreams of two buildings that no longer stand
Untarnished | Ali Rizvi | FALL 2020
After a patient reveals a racist bent, his longtime physician questions his own moral choices.
Until You're Blue in the Face | Katie Kress | SPRING 2015
A woman navigates her recent diagnosis of PTSD through self-reflection.
The Unwanted Familiar | Sarah Gurley-Green | FALL 2019
There’s no easy way to uproot the worm in your skull.
Vacant Lots | Laura Anne White | SPRING 2019
Death, on a daily basis, wears on a clinician’s soul. Sometimes, imagining ‘how it might have been’ for a patient, can be a resolution.
Waiting | Shireen Heidari | SPRING 2022
At the end it is not always a test or an exam that provides an answer, sometimes it is touch.
Warmth is a Measure of Time | Dora Chen | SPRING 2022
What does the future hold for a young couple in the delivery room? A young doctor’s meditation.
Weight Loss | Carmela McIntire | FALL 2021
A grieving wife remembers —and tries to understand—her late husband's deadly obsession
Vigil | Julie Freedman | SPRING 2021
A physician reflects on encounters with a woman and her husband near the end of the woman’s life—a woman who loves to garden, who asks for a sandwich, who “wants control.”
"Wanna Play Doctor?" | Lauren Kascak | SPRING 2014
During a pre-med program in Ghana, a student questions her role in a medical mission.
Watch and Wait | Orly Farber | SPRING 2019
When cancer is in the family, it’s not always easy for a clinician to be an onlooker.
Watching | Thom Schwarz | SPRING 2015
Family and caregiver know the end is near for a patient and witness it in different ways.
Wednesdays and Sundays | Susan Wigoda | SPRING 2014
A mother reflects on caring for her son after he was diagnosed with leukemia by recalling the Wednesdays and Sundays when she would change the dressing on his central line.
Weight | Karen Germain | SPRING 2020
The burden of grief can be a heavy load.
We Knew Her In Death | Laila Knio | SPRING 2020
On medical matters of the heart.
We Name Our Snakes | Nancy Huggett | SPRING 2022
Winner takes all: A board game becomes both a diversion and a metaphor as a family experiences profound changes.
What I Never Got to Tell You | Michelle Silver | SPRING 2022
A physician sees patients’ experiences through the lens of her own father’s journey.
What of the Hives | Maddie Norris | SPRING 2018
A woman interrogates the etiology and etymology of her idiopathic case of hives.
What She Left Me | Ellis Avery | FALL 2015
Pain and Memory. A writer remembers her mother through the illness they share.
What We See When We See Each Other | Catherine Klatzker | SPRING 2015
A woman is confronted with another side of herself as she seeks a new form of healing.
When Suicide Speaks Arabic | Ibrahim Sablaban | FALL 2020
A breathtaking illustration of cultural differences surrounding mental illness and how not to make assumptions.
Where Nobody Can Follow | Gary Hunter | SPRING 2018
The pathfinder: A man faces a series of cancers with strength and courage.
Where the White Coat Hangs | Michelle Byrne | SPRING 2016
What are the true tasks of a physician in the burn unit? A student learns, quickly.
Who's Counting | Beth Leibson | SPRING 2016
A woman shares a new perspective on cancer cells as they intersect with her life.
Why Compassion? | Martha Nance | FALL 2018
A physician’s musings on “com-passion” with patients with neurodegenerative diseases
"Why Don't They Just Call It That?" Conversations That Fail To Communicate | Pratyusha Yalamanchi | SPRING 2016
Sometimes, no matter how much time is spent explaining a procedure, doctors and patients find it hard to understand what the other is truly saying.
Wind Tunnel | Kenneth Weinberg | SPRING 2017
A couple's denial astounds even the most seasoned ER physician.
Without the Violence | Mercedes Frankl | | SPRING 2015
A doctor parallels her own personal narrative on love and health with those of her patients.
The Witness | Yoshiko Iwai | SPRING 2019
On shadowing, and what it takes to listen and understand.
Yom Kippur | Lisa Gruenberg | SPRING 2014
Remembering a father, recovering lost moments of history, through words and snapshots.
Your Little Heart Still Stands | Alexis Rehrmann | SPRING 2022
After moments of loss and grief, a family project unites and brings a measure of healing.