Title : 11 seconds magazine: Reimagining the "Women's Health" conversation through digital media
Abstract:
Medicine is at the heart of science, technology, and innovation. A field that has long since been revolutionized, it is arguably, as Osler would say " a science of uncertainty and an art of probability." How does this transform our experiences today, in the digital age? Patient stories make up much of medicine, and yet, as the healthcare system in the United States becomes more technologically advanced, efficient, and goal-oriented, the story is often lost. In fact, it can be lost in just 11 seconds (Phillips et al., 2019). So, who’s listening? Or better yet, how do we make them listen? Women occupy a unique positionality within this relationship; the uterus, though at the center of reproduction through menstruation, gestation, and childbirth for a female body, has been socially constructed for centuries to either be the cause of deviance, and if not that, then as an autonomous entity that has been fetishized and labeled as the root for hysteria.
As “women’s health” becomes more critically defined in relation to care and care provision, it is important to consider what the patient’s story really looks like in the context of the medical encounter and the impacts on mental health that occurs when these stories get lost. In fact, research shows that "women's magazines are not mere reporters/reproducers of health information provided by health promotion agencies, scientific journals or medical professionals, they are also discourses to be studied to better understand how messages about health are created as a representation of a particular view of reality."
So, how does The 11 Seconds Magazine reinvent the idea of a "women's magazine?" How can we use creative writing and other forms of innovative media as a method to explore the unexplored in women's health? Although nonfiction works via a digital magazine may not seem like the most rigorous platform for medical knowledge dissemination, it serves as a crucial platform to convey the true lived experiences. It has the potential to change the conversation for youth, to turn everyone into an advocate for their own health, especially as one explores topics often cast to the wayside, like PCOS, abortion, fertility, endometriosis, and postpartum depression.
Audience Take Away:
- Evaluate and consider the role of creative writing, journalism, art, and graphic design as solutions to traumatic experiences in healthcare - with a focus on women's obstetric and gynecological health experiences.
- Distinguish how one can convey the truth behind their story in a manner that remains authentic to themselves and why medical humanities is a crucial innovation for the field of medicine and the challenges that women’s health as a field currently faces.
- Justify how changing the conversation around health, health advocacy and literacy now will significantly impact our youth and future generations for the better by putting taboo aside.
- This presentation will help the audience become more cognizant of the struggles behind women’s health experiences, especially those that are considered taboo or not worth discussing as per normative social convention. Our mission at 11 Seconds Magazine as it pertains to women' s health is to go beyond the gender binary.
- First and foremost, “women’s health” as a colloquialism for the practices of obstetrics and gynecology is inherently reductionist; it does not adequately include all those who may seek OB/GYN care, those who may not identify as female, nor does it openly acknowledge that gender is a social construct; sexual identity and orientation is far more complex that the limitations often imposed in this binary approach.
