Lunch provided at NOON ▪ Talk begins at 12:10pm

At the heart of clinical medicine lies the history and physical, rendering in words the patient’s experience and the practitioner’s sensory impressions in search of a diagnosis and therapeutic plan. The clinician starts with a body and ends with a story: a means to re-member the patient for herself and her colleagues, a foundation for any healing work. Using clinical encounters, poetry, and medical narrative, Dr. Volck explores medicine as attentive presence and storied practice, an ongoing dance of observation, action, and memory.

Brian Volck, MD has served the children of the Navajo Nation and rural Honduras, worked at an inner city community health center, and now teaches medical students, residents, and fellows at a major research hospital. He published a poetry collection, Flesh Becomes Word, in 2013, and a memoir, Attending Others: A Doctor’s Education in Bodies and Words, in 2016. His essays, poetry, and reviews have appeared in The Christian Century, DoubleTake, Health Affairs, and IMAGE.