Can storytelling of women’s lived experience enhance empathy in medical students? A pilot intervention study

This pilot study aimed to investigate the acceptability and efficacy of a patient storytelling intervention (live and recorded) on empathy levels of medical students. Medical students participated in a storytelling intervention that had three components: listening to live or recorded stories from women with abnormal uterine bleeding, reflective writing, and a debriefing session. Empathy scores of students pre- and post-intervention were measured using the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-student version (JSE-S). Students also completed a feedback survey. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse quantitative data and content analysis was used for text comments. Both live and recorded storytelling interventions had positive effects on student’s empathy scores post intervention. Overall, students were satisfied with the intervention and reported that it improved their understanding of life experiences of women. Suggestions were made for an in-person storytelling session and interactive discussion after listening to each story. A storytelling intervention has the potential to improve medical students’ empathy and understanding of lived experience of women with health conditions. This could be valuable when student-patient interactions are limited in healthcare settings, or to enable stories of small numbers of patient volunteers to reach students.本先导性研究旨在探究患者叙事干预（含现场与录播形式）对医学生共情水平的接受度与干预效果。研究中，医学生参与了涵盖三大模块的叙事干预活动：聆听患有异常子宫出血的女性所讲述的现场或录播故事、开展反思性写作以及参与复盘讨论会。本研究采用杰弗逊共情量表学生版（Jefferson Scale of Empathy-student version, JSE-S），对干预前后医学生的共情得分进行测评；参与学生同时完成了反馈调查问卷。量化数据采用描述性统计与推断性统计方法进行分析，文本评论则通过内容分析法开展编码与解读。结果显示，现场与录播两种叙事干预形式均能有效提升学生干预后的共情得分。整体而言，参与学生对本次干预活动满意度较高，并反馈该活动提升了他们对女性群体生活经历的认知与理解。参与学生还提出了优化建议：增设线下叙事分享环节，并在聆听每一则故事后组织交互式讨论。本研究表明，叙事干预有望提升医学生的共情能力，并增进其对罹患疾病女性亲身经历的理解。在医疗场景中，当医学生与患者的互动受限，或是少量患者志愿者的故事难以触达更多医学生时，该干预模式具备较高的应用价值。