Medical Anthropology Network: Working group teaching health professionals

Created in 2015, the working group aims to courage networking and exchange among anthropologists involved in teaching medical anthropology to professionals and students from a wide range of health professions. Currently 25 to 30 are members of the workgroup and engage actively in events and exchange.

History
At the 2013 MAN meeting in Tarragona, a roundtable discussion was held on teaching medical anthropology. During the discussion, Dr. Torsten Risor, a Danish medical doctor and anthropologist (Arctic University of Norway - Tromsø) argued that medical anthropology was important for future health professionals.
Following this meeting, Ruth Kutalek (Medical University Vienna) and Margret Jäger (SFU Linz) initiated a working group in 2015 with the aim of encouraging networking and exchange among anthropologists involved in teaching medical anthropology to professionals and students from a wide range of health professions.

Activities to date:

  1. A first meeting of the working group was help at the MAN meeting in Brighton, UK in 2015, where we discussed current theories, good texts, and the challenges of teaching anthropology to (future) health professionals.
  2. A questionnaire was developed to facilitate the creation of a database of anthropologists involved in teaching health professionals, as well as encourage exchange of teaching materials and approaches. To date, 25 anthropologists have completed the questionnaire.
  3. A panel session was held at the MAN meeting in Lisbon, Portugal in July 2017, where colleagues from Chile, U.S.A., Japan, UK, Switzerland and Austria discussed their challenges and approaches to teaching medical anthropology to health professionals. At the end of the session, we discussed potential future activities of the working group.
  4. A workshop was held at EASA2018 in Stockholm on Teaching anthropology to health professionals .

The working group is coordinated by Margret Jäger and Patricia Hudelson (Geneva University Hospitals).  Please feel free to contact us if you are interested in joining the working group or have any questions. We believe that medical anthropology should form an integral part of health professional training.

Margret Jäger [margretjaeger(at)yahoo.com]
Patricia Hudelson [Patricia.Hudelson(at)hcuge.ch]