By Olivia Brown

Smile and knock — enter when permitted.

Shaky and washing my hands.

“What brings you in today?”

Loud enough for the cameras to pick up – empathy.

Interview progresses, grades hopeful.

Past medical history ending, home stretch.

“And when was your last period?”

Gentle smile.

“Menopause for ten years.”

Note to self — check patient’s age before entering.

Olivia Brown is a third-year medical student who wrote this piece to reveal that humor can often be found inside the practice of medicine

By Stephanie Gardner

I worried…. despite her insistence that she was “just fine.” And now my heart aches with things unsaid.  Questions unasked, sentiments not shared. Yet, as I reread her last email, I once again marvel at her fortitude, brilliance, determination, and unbridled passion.  And I conclude….she was right.  She was “just fine.” Unmistakably, exquisitely, fine.

Stephanie Gardner, Pharm.D., Ed.D., is Provost and a professor in the UAMS College of Pharmacy. She is an avid reader and passionate about promoting the arts on our campus.

By Stephen Phillip Johnson

They come, in shifts— through side entrances, private doors…. most

wearing comfortable, expensive shoes, color-matched pants and tops

squeezing-in last minute family talk, world business…. on cell phones.

Somewhere in this sanctum cube (say, Room 416), a bed-bound soul alerts

to the Change, hopefulness warming; the One with the soft touch is near!

Stephen Phillip Johnson is a Mountain Home carpenter. Writing is his itch. Within the halls of medicine, where he’s been (repeatedly) healed, reside flocks of muses.

By Collie Mason Shaw

“What will it do, kill me?”  

Said a wearied coal miner 

Who caught me eyeing the tobacco smoke 

Pouring from his tracheostomy. 

“I don’t want to live forever, just long enough,”  

As he lit another spliff 

Half jaw working hard verbalizing regret 

“Just three months to turn my life around, I don’t want a miracle.”

Collie Shaw graduated from the UAMS College of Medicine. She is currently an intern at Unity Health in Searcy, Arkansas and wrote this to emphasize the heartfelt emotions of end of life and goals of care.

By Quentin Parker

medical student.

the pager beeps

it is a race to the trauma call.

A first.

patient.

gunshot wound.

a roar of voices surrounds.

a first and possibly a last.

medial staff.

another gunshot wound.

organized chaos ensues.

a normal day.

medical student and staff.

bellowing moment of silence.

remembering a stranger,

a first of many.

Quentin Parker is a fourth-year medical student in the College of Medicine and recently matched into Anesthesiology at UAMS. In his spare time he enjoys spending time in the outdoors with his wife and daughters.