Narrative Medicine: The Use of History and Story in the Healing Process (Paperback)

~ (Author), Thom Hartmann (Foreword)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Challenging the voice of conventional health care, Mehl-Medrona (Coyote Medicine) demonstrates the limits of modern medicine by looking to the perspectives and stories that have kept indigenous cultures (including his own Cherokee ancestors) healthy for centuries. A professor of family medicine and psychiatry, Mehl-Madrona avoids a "problem-based" vantage point, addressing root causes where conventional medicine addresses symptoms, using the body's natural tendency toward harmony and balance where others use drugs. Though it's not a new thesis, Mehl-Madrona illustrates it cleverly and accessibly ("Classical medicine stops at the frame of the body, ignoring the social world and... its multiple frames"). Mehl-Medrona invites readers into powerful tribal talking circles, as well as the sweatlodge, where patients conceptualize illness as an entity to battle. Case studies from North American and Hawaii natives demonstrate how stories themselves can spur healing: one troubled Hawaii youth was only able to identify his self-destructive behavior, and his need for help, after hearing a folk story about a boy with a man-eating shark mouth on his back. Though clearly pushing an agenda, Mehl-Madrona's arguments are compelling and level-headed, but occasionally lose momentum to excess exposition. This look at story and community's role in individual health convincingly advocates for a larger, more inclusive, more complete health care system.
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Review

"Lewis Mehl-Madrona is an extraordinarily gifted physician and healer. I saw him transform the lives of profoundly affected patients. Mostly, he was sitting next to them, listening carefully and telling them stories. I was amazed."
(David Servan-Schreiber, M.D., Ph.D., Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh, author of Instinct to Heal )

“Some people say that we are made of molecules and cells, but Lewis Mehl-Madrona insists that we are made of stories. Stories involve a whole person in a historical context and in a whole environment. This more expansive view of ourselves is more true-to-life and real. Dr. Mehl-Madrona teaches us to learn our own story and to use it to heal ourselves and to appreciate our own soul’s path.”
(Dana Ullman, MPH, author of The Homeopathic Revolution and coauthor of Everybody’s Guide to Homeopathic Medicines )

“Dr. Mehl-Madrona’s work with Narrative Medicine is both powerful and exciting. He meets each patient as a unique individual instead of a diagnosis. He provides story after story of successes that are not within the normal spectrum of modern medicine, and breaks down narrative medicine into components so we may catch a glimpse of how it achieves its success. He brings the reader back to listening and compassion, the two human aspects of medicine that are crucial to the doctor-patient relationship. His view of medicine and healing expands how one looks at the illness, health, and community.”
(Ann Marie Chiasson, M.D., MPH, CCFP, Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine, University of Arizona )

“It is clear from Lewis Mehl-Madrona’s work that healing is far too complex a process to entrust to the western medical profession. And in opening the door to indigenous voices from outside these professional doors, the present volume is both illuminating and invaluable. My hope is that this book will serve as a beacon and an inspiration for the broadest collaboration in defining and enriching our orientations to health, illness, and cure.”
(Kenneth J. Gergen, Mustin Professor of Psychology, Swarthmore College )

“Stanford Medical School trained Mehl-Madrona invokes the philosophy of his Cherokee and Lakota ancestors to remind us that the path to redemption for today’s health care world is to honor the patient’s life story with all of its elements of culture, community, family, health beliefs, spirituality, and individuality. Mehl-Madrona’s narrative contribution is possibly the most inclusive philosophy ever proposed in medicine. “After reading Narrative Medicine, when we come face-to-face with that terrible question, ‘Doc, how long have I got to live?’ we will know that the answer cannot be found in a statistic or the natural history of a disease, but depends upon your unique story--the one told up until this point and especially the one authored from this point onward.”
(Farrell Silverberg, Ph.D., author of Make the Leap: A Practical Guide to Breaking the Patterns That Hold You Back )

“Our stories bring us comfort and help us become acquainted with our unanticipated dreams and fears. Narrative Medicine helps us connect to this personal taproot enhancing our understanding of how we can find our way back to wellness in crisis.”
(Roberta Lee, Continuum Center for Health and Healing, Beth Israel Medical Center, New York )

"Addressing shamanism, quantum physics, critical theory, and more, this book will appeal to a wide variety of readers, including healing practitioners . . ."
(Blanche Angelo, Library Journal Xpress Reviews, July 2007 )

"The author writes very well, weaving examples throughout, as well as stories from a variety of cultures, showing how he uses stories in his practice with actual patients." (
D. Tigermoon, The Pagan Review, Nov 2007
)

"Dr. Lewis Mehl-Madrona presents us with a sincere and well-researched case for a new approach to mental and physical health. . . . as well as cutting-edge sociological developments in transformational studies." (
David Paulsen, New Age Retailer, Jan 2008
)

"It is quite refreshing to read the perspective of a health-care practitioner who can draw on his own cultural experience and articulate his interventions scientifically. Yet, at the same time he does not alienate the reader by romanticizing his uniqueness." (
PsycCritiques of the American Psychological Association, Mar 2008
)

"Dr. Mehl-Madrona treats each of his patients as a unique individual with a history and a story rather than simply a diagnosis. As well as listening with compassion, he offers a traditional story to help a patient gain insight into their illness and path to wellness. Most of the stories he shares come from North American Native culture as that is Dr. Mehl-Madrona's heritage." (
Ann Moore, Synergy Magazine, Vol. 6, Issue 2, Mar/Apr 2009 )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Bear & Company; 1 edition (June 22, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591430658
• ISBN-13: 978-1591430650
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #314,321 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not a "tool" like narrative therapy: this is a new way of seeing. , April 6, 2008

By	Nancy L. Howe "survivor and cancer researcher" (Scottsdale, AZ) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Narrative Medicine is a radical critique of conventional medicine in which Mehl-Madrona, M.D., Ph.D. challenges the knowledge system that physicians, especially psychiatrists, use to diagnose illness and direct treatment. Mehl-Madrona's writing style is straight-forward and concrete, enlivened with his skillful use of patient stories and historical examples drawn from his years in practice and as a professor of medicine, currently at University of Saskatchewan and before that, University of Arizona. He traces the philosophical roots of western medicine's fundamental axioms that disease can be understood with a mechanistic, biological model alone, and that valid medical solutions must generalize to a large population. Mehl-Madrona uses clinical experiences, recent research in physics, and advances in post-modern philosophy to underscore how these medical truths are, in themselves, a story. "Narrative therapy," as described by more than 200 Amazon authors, is promoted as an effective tool to be added to the physician's standard repertoire. Narrative medicine, by contrast, is not a tool; it is a way of seeing. In Mehl-Madrona's experience, storytelling is transformative, capable of promoting healing as a consequence of the interplay between teller and listeners.

As a cancer researcher, I found that Narrative Medicine held the key to understanding interviews I conducted with ovarian cancer survivors. I had asked these women to tell me how they learned of their diagnosis. What they told me were stories of how their illness had changed their self-understanding. For most, their interactions with the medical community had been frustrating and fragmented. They described being shuttled back and forth among a variety of experts (e.g., nephrologists, internists, and GI specialists), few of whom had the time or patience to listen when the women attempted to describe how their symptoms had unfolded. For all of them, the diagnostic process was frightening and disheartening.

My colleague found that Mehl-Madrona's analysis of bi-polar disorder and the current predominance of the biochemical explanation mirrored her experience. As a "non-responder" to standard medications, her hopes for relief had been undermined by the prevailing view that bi-polar disorder is a life-long biochemical imbalance for which drugs are the only effective treatment. "What I do now to help myself includes many of the approaches contained in the healing stories in Narrative Medicine," she told me. "Like Mehl-Madrona says, my solution is particular and works for me; other people in my support group find that their stories spur them to actions that are very different from mine, but equally helpful. Narrative Medicine gave me a new understanding of why that might be."

For a single text --- and a paperback at that! --- to accomplish both these tasks is testimony to the breadth of application available to the reader who is open to Narrative Medicine's premise.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as "Coyote Medicine", July 27, 2009

By	Stuart Dole (Santa Rosa, CA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The overall tone of this book is plodding and academic, compared to Mehl-Madrona's "Coyote Medicine". Either he changed editors or didn't use one. Not much new material. But this may appeal more to academic types. I much preferred the dynamic personal narrative of the earlier book.

5.0 out of 5 stars Narrative Medicine is filled with deep wisdom and insight., September 4, 2009

By	Christine Cameron (Hudson Valley, NY) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I am so grateful to have serendipitously stumbled upon Dr. Lewis Mehl-Madrona's work. Narrative Medicine is filled with deep wisdom and insight into the process of healing. He brings heart and soul to a profession which has become largely cold and clinical. Witnessing my Mother's health decline and then finally her diagnosis and cancer treatment truly opened my eyes to the heartlessness of our Western system. Reading Narrative Medicine made me feel less alone in my belief that health and wholeness is more rich and complex than diagnosing and medicating. I have been blessed with personally meeting and witnessing Dr. Mehl-Madrona at work. As a result, my view of illness and disease will never be the same. I highly recommend this book!