Story time with your doctor: How narrative medicine could improve your health

Follow up after surgery
File | Alex Kolyer | For MPR News

When was the last time you told your doctor the story of that pain that keeps coming back in the middle of the night? The story of how your parents died and your own fears about that?

Most of us hear the clock ticking in our heads when we're in the examining room. After all, the doctor's time is valuable and you've only allotted so much time to see her. But a concept called "narrative medicine" challenges that.

A number of medical schools and institutions are using it now. MPR News host Kerri Miller talked with a physician and a playwright about what place stories play in our health and health care.

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