E - ISSN: 2709-5533
Vol 5 / Ene - Jun [2024]
globalrheumpanlar.org
Videoblog
Gabo and Medicine: What Literature Has to Offer at PANLAR 2024
Autor: Estefanía Fajardo: Science journalist for Global Rheumatology by PANLAR, estefaniafajardod@gmail.com
DOI: https://doi.org/10.46856/grp.233.et190
Cite: Fajardo E. Gabo and Medicine: What Literature Has to Offer at PANLAR 2024. Global Rheumatology. Vol 5/ Ene - Jun [2024] Available from: https://doi.org/10.46856/grp.233.et190
Received date: March 27th / 2024
Accepted date: March 26th / 2024
Published Date: April 10th / 2024
Juan Valentín Fernández de la Gala will discuss "The Doctors of Macondo," a research project addressing Medicine in the work of Colombian Nobel Prize winner. Additionally, he will lead a narrative workshop aimed at attendees of the Pan-American Congress.
EF: Hello everyone and welcome to a new video blog from Global Rheumatology where we'll be addressing everything that PANLAR 2024 Pan-American Congress brings us, to be held in Barranquilla.
We are here with Dr. Juan Valentín Fernández de la Gala. Doctor, welcome, and tell us about your presence at PANLAR 2024, how will it be?
JF: Very well, good morning, afternoon, evening, depending on how the viewers hear us. What I have to say is that I am here by explicit invitation from the Scientific Committee, which I know values not only the presence of the latest research gathered at the Congress. Not only in rheumatological research and clinical practice, but they have also recognized the importance of the humanistic roots of our profession, which since the time of Hippocrates, Hippocrates himself didn't know whether to define as a science and tended to define it more as an art.
My participation, then, will consist of the opening lecture and a workshop on narrative strategies. Both will have a common underlying theme, which is to extract from the humanities everything they have taught us, continue teaching us, and can continue teaching us. And, of course, the fundamental objective of participating in this PANLAR Congress is to learn rheumatology because, in a way, rheumatological problems are, along with respiratory problems, the most requested in primary health care. And, as if that weren't enough, it would also serve to remind me of my university days when rheumatology classes were particularly revealing because they gave us a systemic view of the body. That is, it was not only about bone and joint pathologies, but it was also fundamentally a study related to calcium and phosphorus metabolism, autoimmunity, and the complex processes involved. And even psychology, the psychological sphere of the patient, which can often exacerbate symptoms.
EF: Doctor, we will have the opening lecture on medicine and doctors in Gabriel García Márquez's time... Gabo, the Caribbean, medicine, a mixture that will undoubtedly be wonderful and charming in the context of being next to the Magdalena River and being in Barranquilla.
JF: Certainly, a city tremendously linked to Gabo. What I propose in this opening lecture is a bridge, again, a bridge between sciences and humanities. One of the things that I remember a lot is that when I undertook this work, which is my doctoral thesis, one thing that struck me was the extraordinary rigor with which Gabriel García Márquez addressed medical issues. There are toxicological descriptions, for example, that are brilliant, like the ones that open Love in the Time of Cholera, cyanide poisoning, and then I had the opportunity to meet Gonzalo, Gabo's youngest son, and I took advantage of it and asked him, Gonzalo, who were your father's medical advisors? Who was the doctor who advised your father? Because, obviously, as a journalist, he didn't have to have that exhaustive knowledge of the subject. And then he absolutely disappointed me because he said to me, "My father didn't have a medical advisor." Which really worried me because that was what supported all the research work of my doctoral thesis. "My father," he told me, "did not have a medical advisor. He had a whole medical team behind him, gynecologists, psychiatrists, general practitioners, pediatricians, who he bothered day and night and called at introspective hours to ask, how could I kill this character, but make it last three chapters? Or, how could I kill him, but have him die quickly like a footnote?" And that's basically what we show in The Doctors of Macondo and reserve some surprises that listeners may find interesting.
EF: But also, together we will be in a workshop on narrative strategies in science, writing impactful scientific articles, where we will explore how storytelling enhances scientific communication. As a communicator, I have very high expectations, but I want to know you as a doctor, what do you hope to present to your colleagues on this whole topic?
JF: Well, as in any workshop, where the important thing is not the communication of theoretical knowledge but doing things together really, I go with all the humility in the world. That is, I am going to learn, to learn from you, who are a communication professional and, therefore, have a lot to contribute in that sense, and to learn from all my medical colleagues, because in a way, doctors are also experts in narrative art.
There was a Spanish doctor, Dr. Gregorio Marañón, the creator of the field of endocrinology in Spain, who always said, "the greatest invention of medicine is not antibiotics or X-rays, the greatest invention of medicine is the chair." The chair, Don Gregorio? How can the chair be the greatest invention of medicine? Yes, he said. And he also said, "because it is the place where the doctor and the patient meet and establish dialogue between them."
The environment where this happens is called a consultation, which is also a word that alludes to a dialogue. A dialogue almost Socratic. Doctors, believe it or not, also tell stories. Our stories are called medical histories. And, moreover, with a particularity. And it is that I believe that probably among the most famous and sincere stories in the world of lies we live in today, they can still be told because it is a place where one opens up and expresses their utmost confidence between doctor and patient, and maybe we tell the doctor things that we can't even tell our closest family members sometimes. Doctor, ultimately I consider it important to draw on all these tools that we bring from literature and communication, but the exercise of medicine as it is proposed at this point and in different areas.
EF: Which do you think, as a preamble to everything you will bring to PANLAR 2024 and also to bring many to this workshop that we are going to propose, and to the opening lecture, what are the three key tools that a doctor should consider in this regard?
JF: There are many tools that we can put into play, but if you ask me for three, Estefanía, I would tell you that fundamentally they are: first, the ability to grab attention is fundamental for medicine. Second, clarity, and third, simplicity to grab attention, it is something that we can even learn from the great speakers of classical antiquity like Cicero, for example, who took great care of what he called Captatio, that is, he devoted a large part of the discourse to capturing the attention of the listeners about what he was going to say, in fact, even the Latins have a special case in their declensions called vocatio, to call the attention of the other, and García Márquez in his magnificent and tremendously seductive art in handling words is much what he can teach us. We have extracted some lessons on the narrative art of Gabo and how we can apply it to our world of research and scientific dissemination about clarity, remembering a bit what Ortega y Gasset said, clarity is the courtesy of the philosopher. And about simplicity, well, a very simple thing, and it is that I think it is something that doctors must learn a lot. We are often accused of not being clear enough when we explain their pathologies to patients. We must avoid, both in communication with the patient and in our scientific communication, scientific research writings, scientific journals, we must avoid circumlocutions, we must avoid syntactic baroqueness and seek a much simpler exercise. In Medicine, this is fundamental not only to write a scientific article, but also to disseminate, as you do, in any media, or even to talk to our patients or talk to our students.
EF: Doctor, thank you very much, and we will be very attentive to everything that this opening lecture will be and everything that you will bring with this workshop. And then it only remains to say, see you in Barranquilla.
JF: Exactly, see you in Barranquilla from April 10 to 13.
