How do women find their voice when their health stories are met with silence, skepticism, or stigma? In this deeply personal and powerful episode, Dr. Emily Cripe of Kutztown University joins host Dr. Lynn Harter to explore how women transform private pain into public advocacy. Through raw storytelling and thoughtful reflection, Cripe shares her own experiences navigating uncertain medical diagnoses and misunderstood health conditions. Together, Cripe and Harter examine the communication challenges faced by women in medical contexts—from cesarean births to adult diagnoses of ADHD.
You can read articles featured in this episode in the journal Health Communication at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2331999 https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2017.1298953

How do we give voice to complex stories that defy words and the conventions of language?
These stories, often of trauma or other profound lived experiences, reside not just in our heads and hearts, but in every cell in our body. Embodied stories are layered, complex, and often chaotic. They vie for expression but lack a means or a format to accommodate them.

In this episode of Defining Moments, Dr. Marie Thompson, Professor of Communication at Wright State University, joins host Dr. Joe Bianco to share her pioneering work on narrative mapping. Narrative mapping is a form of visual storytelling born within a carefully cultivated relational setting. Through deep listening and guided questions, Marie creates space for participants to visually map their emerging stories, creating layered representations of their innermost experiences.

You can read Marie’s articles published in Health Communication at: · https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2414471 · https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2020.1733228
You can see “Cracked but Never Broken,” Megan Westerfeld’s narrative map referenced in the episode, here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/cracked-never-broken-barbara-geralds-institute-for-stor-bovzc

As medicine heeds the call of patient-centered care, it is easy to overlook the other person in the clinic room. Physicians, like patients, have stories. Within the everyday demands of clinical practice, however, their stories are seldom invited and remain untold.

In this episode of Defining Moments, medical students Libby Hill and Sumedha Kappagantula join host Dr. Joe Bianco to share their experiences as Executive Producers of Behind the White Coat, an annual storytelling event at Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine. Founded in 2019 by medical students, Behind the White Coat invites students, physicians, medical educators, and staff to reveal their defining moments on the path toward medicine. The conversation invites us to reimagine the white coat as a blank page, ready to receive and reveal our innermost stories.

You can learn more about Behind the White Coat and view story archives from previous years here: https://www.ohio.edu/medicine/behind-white-coat. To learn more about the Open Book Project referenced in this episode, listen to Lynn Harter’s conversation with Dr. Tracy Shaub: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/defining-moments-podcast-conversations-about-health/id1456643447?i=1000445540298 and read the accompanying Health Communication article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2018.1551302

Childhood cancer is the number one disease killer of children in the U.S. Even so, only four percent of that National Cancer Institute’s budget focuses on childhood cancers. These are more than abstract statistics for this episode’s guests Angela Dina and Michelle Payne. Angela and Michelle are founders of Turn it Gold, a non-profit that elevates awareness about childhood cancer and survivorship. Angela and Michelle join co-host Dr. Lynn Harter to reflect on the origin of the organization, the role of faith in their healing journeys, and the importance of athletic activism in shifting the landscape of childhood cancer care.

You can read an article about Turn it Gold in the journal Health Communication at: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10410236.2019.1651624
You can watch a trailer for the PBS documentary Realistically Ever After: A Turn it Gold Movement at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXgsV5Tjn5o

Dr. Ally Hughes, Assistant Professor of Primary Care at Ohio University, joins co-host Dr. Joe Bianco to recount her journey from being diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age seven to a career as a diabetes and disabilities researcher, educator, and advocate. The conversation reveals that there is more to diabetes than shame, stigma, and medical trauma. Ally sheds light on innovative medical advances and finds hope in social and online networks dedicated to improving the lives of persons with diabetes.

You can read Ally’s article in Health Communication here: https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2375145

Elena Semino, Distinguished Professor of Linguistics and English Language at Lancaster University, joins host Dr. Joe Bianco to discuss the subtle and surprising ways that language and humor shape health experiences. Dr. Semino uses large, naturally occurring language datasets to identify imaginative alternatives to overused battle analogies in cancer and other chronic illnesses. The conversation reveals that the key to reframing our most challenging problems may be just a metaphor away.

You can read Elena’s articles published in Health Communication at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2020.1844989 and https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2023.2257428. Her metaphor menu for people with cancer is here: https://wp.lancs.ac.uk/melc/the-metaphor-menu

Over 7 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s disease and other associated dementias amid a shortage of health professionals trained to care for aging adults. Drs. Anne Kerber and Kristi Oeding of Minnesota State University Mankato join co-host Dr. Lynn Harter and introduce artful place-making as an innovative approach to organizing and teaching care for people with dementias. They explore the multi-sensory and therapeutic potentials of gardening and how artful place-making can unsettle dominant narratives of aging and disability that over-emphasize deficits.

You can read an article about this project in the journal Health Communication at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2433288