Browsing by Author "Sumner, Tony"
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- Helping tomorrow’s doctors to become reflective practitioners through digital storytellingPublication . Sumner, Tony; Hardy, PipBackground: Latest medical education guidelines in the UK stress the need for doctors to be capable reflective practitioners. However, traditional cultures and methods within medical education departments develop and deliver reflective programmes that are mechanistic and ineffective. This paper describes two programmes run for medical students at two different UK universities based on Reflective digital storytelling principles, and their outcomes. Methods: The Patient Voices Reflective Digital Storytelling process was used to provide reflective opportunities for medical students at the University of Leicester (N=5) in 2008 and Kings College London (N=4) in 2014. In both cases the normal process was adapted to suit student timetables, examination schedules, etc. Experience running Patient Voices Reflective Digital Storytelling workshops for newly-qualified nurses, etc. was used to inform facilitative approaches. Different adaptations were needed in each institution. Results: In both cases all students created reflective stories. Several (N=6) found the process so engaging they created two stories. Student feedback in both cases was powerfully positive, with students arguing at the launch of the stories created for universal adoption of this approach to reflection within their institutions. Students reported bonding as a group and feeling greater empathy with patients while on placement. Conclusions: Digital storytelling can provide the basis for a methodology within which medical students can deeply and effectively reflect on experiences of personal life, training and early practice, but key to this is ensuring a safe facilitative environment within which they can truly reflect rather than merely fill in reflection forms.
- Sacred stories: digital storytelling to preserve the stories of vocation and calling of retired nunsPublication . Sumner, Tony; Hardy, PipBackground: Communities within the EU are aging. For some religious communities this is not just a demographic effect, but one influenced by changes in recruitment rates to the order. As communities age, the tacit knowledge and experiences members carry within them – the stories of vocation and calling – are amongst those most vulnerable to loss, and yet also some of the most valuable and powerful delineators of what it is to be ‘community’. This paper describes a project intended to help the members of a retirement community of nuns in northern England recollect and share their stories. Methods: The Patient Voices Reflective Digital Storytelling process was adapted to suit the needs of the group, using experiences gained in working with elderly patients and service users in health and social care settings. Results: A set of some twenty stories was created with members of the community, in several workshops. Ages of participants ranged up to 101 years. One storyteller returned several times to tell four stories over a period of some years. Several adaptations to the process were needed to fit it to storyteller profile. Conclusions: With appropriate adaptation and support, digital storytelling can be an effective process through which elderly sections of religious communities can preserve and share stories of vocation, calling and life experience. These stories can then provide valuable resources for reflection within the broader part of that religious community, and have common ground with stories told by groups within health and social care.