Sarah Rubin Receives Award Recognizing Humanism in Medicine
Sarah Rubin, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Social Medicine and ADVANCE core faculty member received the Leonard Tow Humanism in Medicine Award. The award recognizes a graduating medical student and faculty member who exemplify humanistic patient care. We asked Dr. Rubin how she defines humanistic patient care: “To me, humanistic patient care is multifaceted. It’s approaching patients as multi-dimensional patients, people in the world. It’s important to think about patients intersectionally [...] thinking about their intersecting identities and the way that they occupy different places in a complex social system and how that shapes their perspective, their life experiences, and their access to resources.”
As an anthropologist, Rubin uses qualitative methods like ethnography to explore how structural constraints shape everyday experiences of mothers and their infants. Rubin also teaches social and cultural topics in the classroom and through her role as co-creator and co-facilitator of the Racism in Medicine Seminar. In her teaching, Rubin demonstrates how the macro and micro are connected and create uneven patterns of health and illness across existing power and resource imbalances.
Rubin contends that fostering physicians' understanding of medicine as a distinct cultural entity represents a stride toward achieving health equity: “It’s super important for doctors to think about their own place in the world and how it overlaps and doesn't overlap with the patient in front of them; to understand medicine as its own cultural system that shapes their own perspective and biases and structures their relationship with their patient.” Rubin says that it is through this process that humanistic physicians are created. As Rubin puts it, “Understanding how structures impact the everyday experiences of patients creates empathy, humility, and compassionate curiosity.”
Rubin said that receiving this prestigious award was gratifying for her and her colleagues: “I was completely surprised to win this award because I had only heard of physicians receiving it. [...] receiving this award means that my, and my colleagues’ work, teaching humanism to future doctors matters, that it counts, and that it’s not only improving our students’ education but having an impact in medicine more broadly.”
The Institute to Advance Health Equity (ADVANCE) supports faculty research from multiple disciplines, methods, colleges, schools and departments across Ohio University to foster team science and facilitate clinical and community research partnerships. For information on membership, weekly writing group, or our monthly research seminars, visit https://www.ohio.edu/chsp/advance.