NARRATIVE AS A TOOL IN MEDICAL EDUCATION: THE USE OF THE MCGILL ILLNESS NARRATIVE INTERVIEW

Résumé En

This study presents an experience of using a narrative eliciting tool- MINI-McGill Illness Narrative Interview (Groleau, Young and Kirmayer, 2006) - in training medical students and evaluated possible effects that the use of the narrative eliciting tool would bring in the training process of students.We employed a qualitative methodology in field research. Data was collected in focus groups and interviews with 13 students participating in a university extension program on mental health, crack alcohol and drugs, from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro/Campus Macaé. The narrative analysis was done using the methodology of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). As results we found that the students, despite of being in different periods of medical school (there were students from 2nd to 6th periods), were capable of establishing more attentive, interested and reflective relationships with patients, mediated by listening the patients (verbal and non-verbal) narratives and not just by the sight (of a pathological lesion, a laboratory exam, etc), an intersubjective relationship, in which subjects - medical student and patient - are inserted in a linguistic community and are capable of exchanging values and ideas about illness and disease. (Serpa Júnior et al., 2007). We conclude that the use of the narrative tool MINI in medical training can help the development of narrative skills, leading to the establishment of a medical-patient relationship less disease centred and more patient centred.