My class, “Critical Humanities of Health and the Body,” watched Let the Record Show during a module on epidemics. While many materials commonly used in teaching medical humanities courses show how the arts and humanities can interpret notions of disease and healing, this documentary beautifully demonstrates how they can do so much more: change policy, raise awareness, and reset medical research agendas. Many students born after the 1990s were not aware that AIDS used to be a stigmatized death sentence, nor that it primarily afflicted the gay male population. LTRS recast their understanding of this illness, and the personal anecdotes of the interviewees demonstrated to a future generation of doctors the importance of connecting with the humanity of patients, no matter what their affliction.

Melissa  

--  Melissa Bailar, Ph.D. Professor in the Practice of Humanities Associate Director,

Humanities Research Center Rice University