About the Program
Medical Humanities, in its most basic connotation, deals with the intersection of human experience, medical practice, and scientific technology. The field transcends the disciplinary boundaries of academe and engages all aspects of human culture-science, history, ethics, philosophy, literature, religion, art-in a discursive dialogue centered on what medicine means in relation to the individual and society.
The demand for professionals who understand and can convincingly synthesize the ethical, historical, and practical aspects of medicine as they relate to the implementation, control and dissemination of health care continues to grow. In our present society, where advances in science and technology often outpace our ability to understand and cope with new concepts and situations, the need for medical humanitarians is particularly acute.
The Medical Humanities program is conducted jointly by the Caspersen School of Graduate Studies at Drew University and The Raritan Bay Medical Center, an affiliate of Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital and UMD/Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.
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The Core of Our Program: Medical Humanities at Drew
While many graduate and medical schools now offer a course in bioethics, the Caspersen School has chosen to go beyond a curriculum comprised solely of the "ethics of" types of courses. In addition to a required Biomedical Ethics course, all students enrolled in the Medical Humanities program must take a Medical Narrative and complete a Clinical Practicum at Raritan Bay Medical Center in Perth Amboy, New Jersey as part of the program requirements. This unique combination of experiences form the backbone of our program.
Biomedical Ethics allows students to explore the major medical care issues which face the discipline, including discussions of ethical and religious concerns involving abortion, death and dying, and human experimentation. In this course, students learn the language of ethics and how to break down and understand the ethical issues highlighted nightly on the evening news.
In Medical Narrative, students explore how to both "tell" and "read" the stories of illness, various narrative approaches to medical knowledge, focusing on the narrative of illness, ethics and clinical care. Students also explore the varieties of medical narrative, such as anecdote, medical history and case presentation.
The Clinical Practicum offers a hands-on experience which complements and expands classroom learning. During the course of the practicum, students attend 10 clinical sessions (supervised hospital conferences and rounds). The clinical sessions are individualized according to each student's needs and interests. The sessions range from attending the hospital's Bioethics Committee meeting, to a Humanities Conference, to ER observation, ICU rounds, or a Nursing Home visit. This is a seminal experience for Medical Humanities students. Often times, students use their experience in Clinical Practicum as the basis for their theses and dissertations.
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Degree Requirements
The Certificate in Medical Humanities (C.M.H.)
The Certificate in Medical Humanities (C.M.H.) requires the completion of five courses (15 credit hours) with a cumulative GPA of no less than 2.0 (on a 4.0 scale). Three of the courses (Biomedical Ethics, Medical Narrative, Clinical Practicum) are mandatory. The remaining two courses are taken as seminar electives.
The Masters of Medical Humanities (M.M.H.)
The Masters of Medical Humanities (M.M.H.) requires the completion of ten courses (30 credit hours) with a cumulative GPA of no less than 3.0 (on a 4.0 scale). Four of the courses (Biomedical Ethics, Medical Narrative, Clinical Practicum, Thesis Research) are mandatory.
The remaining six courses are taken as seminar electives. Applicants who already hold the C.M.H. or its equivalent from an accredited institution may be granted up to five course units (15 credit hours) of advanced standing upon application to the master's program.
All M.M.H students must prepare a thesis of 50-75 pages.
The Doctor of Medical Humanities (D.M.H.)
The Doctor of Medical Humanities (D.M.H.) requires the completion of nine courses (27 credit hours) with a cumulative GPA of no less than 3.1 (on a 4.0 scale). Four of the courses (Biomedical Ethics, Medical Narrative, Clinical Practicum, Dissertation Research) are mandatory. The remaining five courses are taken as seminar electives.
All D.M.H students must prepare and successfully defend a doctoral dissertation of 150-200 pages.
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Sample Course Offerings
A recent sampling of course offerings include:
- Biomedical Ethics
- Medical Narrative
- Plagues in History
- Ethical Issues in Death and Dying and Doctor-Patient Relationships
- Listening to the Symbolic Language of the Body
- Medical Sociology
- Renaissance and Anti-Renaissance
- Cultural History of Medicine
- Writing to Heal
- The Botany of Healing
- History of Scientific Medicine
- Contemporary Ethical Issues in American Literature
- Religion, Culture and Health in Cross-Cultural Perspective
- Introduction to Ecological Medicine
- Medical Anthropology
- Return to Freud: The School of Jacques Lacan
To learn more about our course offerings, contact the Office of Graduate Admissions for a current Medical Humanities Course Offering brochure.
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Recent Master's Thesis Titles
- Medical Errors: An Argument for Voluntary, Non-Punitive Reporting of Errors in Health Care
- Stress and the Emergency Service Professional
- The Ethical Considerations of the Physician-Pharmaceutical Company Relationship: Is there a conflict of interest?
- The Influence of U.S. War on Medicine
- Humanitarian Medical Intervention in Haiti: A Moral Imperative
- Issues of Bio-Medical Ethics and Genomics: Access to Genome Technology Distributive Justice
- The Doctor Patient Relationship: An Examination of the Tension Between Autonomy and Paternalism
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Cost of Attendance
Tuition and Fees for C.M.H., M.M.H., D.M.H. in 2007-2008
| Application fee (nonrefundable) |
$35 |
| Tuition per credit |
$832 |
| Tuition per credit (summer term) |
$416 |
| Student Health Insurance |
$1,448 |
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Frequently Asked Questions
1. I have family and work commitments. Can I take classes part-time?
Students in the Medical Humanities program may elect to study on a full or part-time basis. Most classes meet in the late afternoon or early evening to accommodate the schedules of working professionals enrolled in the program.
2. It's been a while since I've been in school. Will I feel out-of-place in this program?
Aside from coming from a multitude of professional backgrounds and walks of life, students in the program also reflect a broad range of ages, ethnicities, and countries of origin. A significant strength of the program is the multiplicity of voices that are present in the student body.
3. Do I need to pass comprehensive exams or language exams?
Neither comprehensive nor language exams are required in the Medical Humanities program.
4. I've taken some graduate-level classes at other institutions. Can I transfer those credits to this program?
Generally, the answer is no. The only exception exists where a student may have earned the equivalent of a Certificate in Medical Humanities at another institution and requests that admittance to the Drew master's program with advanced standing (transfer credit). In this instance, the Admissions Committee may grant advanced standing if it is satisfied that the prior course work was comparable to what Drew requires for the C.M.H. This determination rest solely with the Graduate Admissions Committee.
5. What do graduates do with a degree in Medical Humanities?
The Medical Humanities program is not a professional program in the sense that there are prescribed steps individuals follow after graduating. Graduates and current students are a diverse group. They are employed in medical centers, HMO's, private practices, the publishing and legal worlds, and in grant writing and philanthropy, to name but a few occupations. They work in such fields as patient advocacy, clinical ethics, hospital administration, recovery therapy, journal writing/editing, hospice care and the chaplaincy. Many students seek to use the education they receive at Drew to further enhance, complement, and expand their skills and knowledge. The one common denominator among Medical Humanities students is that they are all acutely interested in the discourse that occurs between medicine as a science and care-giving as a humane and humanistic art.
6. Is there campus housing available for students in the Medical Humanities program?
There is a limited amount of campus housing available for full-time students and their families. Units range from dormitories to apartments. There are also commuter rooms available which allow students to stay on campus up to three nights per week.
All apartment and residence hall applications are made to the Housing Office. For more information on graduate housing, visit the Residence Life Web site.
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