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A Mayo Clinic podcast for laboratory professionals, physicians, and students, hosted by Justin Kreuter, M.D., assistant professor of laboratory medicine and pathology at Mayo Clinic, featuring educational topics and insightful takeaways to apply in your practice.
(light music)
- This is Lab Medicine Rounds,
a curated podcast for physicians,
laboratory professionals and students.
I'm your host, Justin Kreuter,
the Bow Tie Bandit of Blood,
a transfusion medicine pathologist
and assistant professor
of laboratory medicine and
pathology at Mayo Clinic.
Today we're rounding with Dr. Laura Tafe,
who works as a surgical
and molecular pathologist,
and is an associate professor of pathology
and laboratory medicine
at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center
in Lebanon, New Hampshire, my alma mater.
We're gonna be talking
about the practice of
art and medicine today.
And I think relevant to that also
is another plug is that Dr. Tafe
is also the current president
of the Association of
Molecular Pathology, so AMP.
So a nice testament that
being active in the arts
does not hinder other career pursuits.
So thanks for joining us today, Dr. Tafe.
- Thank you, Justin.
It's a pleasure to get a
chance to be on here with you
and to see you.
It's been a long time
since we've had a chance to
kind of talk and catch up.
- So yeah, Dr. Tafe was my chief resident
when I was starting off
in my pathology career,
honestly, back when I would
wear regular neck ties.
- Before you were
converted to the bow tie.
- Yes, yes, exactly.
So why don't we kick off for this episode
with kind of what is
your artist origin story?
- Oh, sure.
I think it really goes
back to when I was a child.
I think we are really all
born as creative people
and it really kind of depends
on how we're nourished from there.
So I grew up in a family of teachers
and my father was a music teacher,
and until he switched
careers kind of midlife,
and my mom was an English teacher
and she was also a writer and loved music.
And so I also have an aunt
who's always been very active in art.
So I think that was kind
of always the environment
I grew up with.
And I kind of had parallel
development of my interest
in art and science and medicine,
all really kind of
throughout my early life.
And I think probably around undergrad
is when they probably
started to verge a little bit
and I felt like I needed to
focus on one or the other.
And I clearly went down the
science pathway in medicine
and yeah, so I became a physician.
I didn't do too much art for a long time.
I would occasionally take a weekend class
or dabble in it here and there,
but I kind of put that part
of myself aside for a while.
And through training I
also had two children,
so I had a young family and as you know,
medical training takes a lot of our time
and our focus and energy.
So that part of myself
and my life kind of got
put aside for a while.
And then it's kind of had a revival
in the more recent years,
the last three or so years
I've been doing analog collage
which is cutting up paper
and gluing it together.
And so that's been a real pleasure
and some of what brought me
to coming back to my art,
my mom passed away in
2014 really unexpectedly.
And that kind of sent me into a spiral
of grief and depression for a while.
And around 2019,
I was just a little bit needing
to do something more
with my time and my life,
and my children were
getting a little bit older
and that's when I decided
to come back to the art.
So since then it's been
a high priority of mine
and really kind of integrated
more into my day-to-day life.
- What does that look like,
that relationship of your art practice
and medical practice?
You know, like many of us
kind of appreciate healthcare
is quite demanding,
especially just to keep
up with what's going on,
let alone be a leader like you in AMP,
but also you mentioned
that you really prioritize
your art practice.
So what does that relationship look like?
- I think it's an evolving one
because it's becoming different things
as I continue to do it.
So at first my art was
very, very personal to me
and was really kind of
an extension of myself
totally separate from my job,
totally separate from medicine.
And then slowly as I've
started to share my art,
they're kind of starting to
interdigitate a little bit,
which is pretty interesting.
I do prioritize it
in that I am conscious
about setting aside time
for myself on a weekly basis
to go and do something.
And collage is very nice
because it can be as short
or as long as you would like.
So I can spend 15 minutes in the evening
just cutting things up or
I can spend a few hours.
And I also carry my supplies with me
literally everywhere I go.
So I always have paper
and glue and scissors,
so even if I'm traveling for work,
I can take a few minutes in the evening
and cut up some paper and stuff like that,
that makes me happy and
kind of helps me unwind.
So we can talk a little
bit more as we go about
how it's kind of how the two
have kind of started to merge together
and some of my thoughts on that as well.
- Oh yeah, yeah, please
elaborate about that.
I'd be really kind of curious to see,
and I think it's a
wonderful testament, right,
this I appreciate your honesty about
this is in a state of evolution
and trying to understand,
I guess I kind of go back
to when I was first learning
how to drive a manual transmission
and working that clutch
and accelerator pedal.
I bet it's something like that.
- Yeah, certainly.
There's times when you have
more energy to devote to it
and other times where you have
to kind of lay off a little bit.
That's certainly true.
And as I've started to share my art more,
some other opportunities and connections
have started to come about,
I share online like on Twitter,
and also in my local community
and I've had some people reach out with me
for some projects.
And one recent thing is we
there's a book coming out
called "Artists Remaking Medicine"
that I was asked to do some collages for
and write a little piece about.
And there's other medical professionals
who are also artists in that as well.
And so that is something that's
kind of come about for that.
And I'm also connecting
at my own institution
with our medical school
has a literary journal
called "Lifelines."
Many medical schools actually
have things like this
that I think most of us
don't even recognize exist.
And there's also a arts
program and humanities program
in my hospital that I work at.
So I'm starting to connect
with those kind of people
and sources to think about
how what I do as an artist
can be more possibly integrated
with some of these other
projects that are going on.
And yes, it's developing.
- Yeah, I hear a lot,
lately it's people talking
about there's a shift from,
it's not this or that,
but how is it and right,
how are we working these
two things together?
And so I guess to ask the question
that probably many of the listers
have bubbled around their mind
is the time challenge, right?
Like, you know, that's often as faculty
whenever we're talking
about doing something new
and certainly an art pursuit
might be something new
or it's something on top.
How do you navigate that challenge
of not having enough time?
- That's a very important question
because I think we all
kind have to figure out
our ways to do that best.
One I think for me
it's been really kind
of making it a priority.
So I don't think of my art as a hobby,
I think of it as like a part of something
that's part of my everyday life.
So it's something I just do
rather than have an option of doing.
It's just something I wanna be doing.
So it has a higher priority,
which definitely has mean
that things have had to shift.
So I have honestly
shifted some of my focus
in terms of saying no to
a few more things at work
that are not as interesting to me
or do not feel as meaningful,
and passing those off to
other people, for instance.
So it has been a little bit of a juggling
to try to figure out how it is,
what the pathway forward
is going to look like,
but it's an important thing
and I'm getting a lot of nourishment
inside work and outside of
work from it and exploring it.
So it's something I'm
continuing to be curious about
how it will develop and evolve
and kind of follow that through.
But priority has helped, my
children bing older has helped,
so they don't need me quite as much,
I can disappear for a little
bit in the evening sometimes
and take some time for
myself to do that too.
- That resonates with me.
I've been in the same
boat with the children
and navigating the teenage years now.
- Right.
It's a different challenge, but-
- Exactly.
So what advice do you have
then for our listeners,
we have a diverse listening group,
some clinicians, some laboratory
medicine professionals,
students we also have
listening to this podcast,
I know you have a lot of
interest in education,
new residents out there.
What advice do you have
for those who have interests
in addition to medicine?
- Well, I hope we all have those interests
in addition to medicine.
We just might not
necessarily talk about them.
And I think our work as meaningful
and as important as it might feel,
in healthcare it really is just a job.
And sometimes it's helpful
to have that perspective
that that's not everything that we are
and everything that we do.
And that also allows us to make some space
for other things in our lives, I think.
And so, you know, I recommend
people thinking about that,
their lives as kind of a bigger picture.
I just am not a healthcare
worker, I am a person,
I'm whatever, I like to do other things.
And that you can explore
those other options.
I do have the opportunity
to teach early on in our
med students first year
and they're just about six
weeks into their med school.
It's like in September.
And I do take the time
after one of my lectures
to show them some of my collages
and remind them about maintaining
these parts of ourselves
that help give us balance,
the connections to our families,
asking for help, supporting each other.
And the creativity can be
anything that feels good to you.
It doesn't have to be art,
it could be writing, it could be music,
it can be riding your bicycle,
it can be gardening, cooking.
You know, there's so many different ways
to kind of think about what this could be.
But I think creativity is
incredibly helpful for us
as healthcare workers.
I think it brings curiosity,
it brings flexibility of thought
and so much more into our work.
- You know, as I'm listening to you,
two things to highlight out
for our listeners, right,
is I hear this theme of like
new opportunities, right?
It's not just like you're a collage artist
and you're a physician,
but you're contributing,
you were saying about
this collection coming out
about kind of that blending of the two.
And so it's kind of a nice example
how it didn't really start
out with an intention
for kind of that cross.
But just by putting yourself out there,
by sharing your content,
you've found others and
found new opportunities,
which is really, I
think quite stimulating.
And then I hear a kindness
as well in that, right,
you're talking about saying
no to other opportunities
and I just wanna highlight
for our listeners,
for somebody like you in
these leadership roles,
probably I'm guessing saying
no to some opportunities
means that you're giving
more junior faculty
some opportunities-
- Hopefully yes.
- Which can help their careers as well.
- Yeah, definitely.
It's an opportunity to do
some of that mentoring as well
that it's so important
to us as professionals
and also in our career
and to support others
who are coming behind us
in their careers, yeah.
- Now I always,
I usually kind of close my questions
with where do you think this is going?
And I totally appreciate the fact
that this is an evolving
aspect of your life.
But what are your thoughts on
where does your art practice go
in the coming months to years?
- I think it's going to
probably continue to evolve
along this track of a lot
of it being for myself
and for my own self-expression,
and just that internal
need that I have to create.
And then kind of following my curiosity
through what are these other threads
that are starting to show up
like you mentioned the other connections,
other opportunities that are starting
to kind of catch my attention
and also connect to me.
And I would say in
other areas of medicine,
there is a little bit more
talk about art and humanities.
I think like narrative
medicine, for instance,
is becoming more discussed
and more developed
and more taught for other
subspecialties in medicine.
And you know, in pathology,
we don't have a lot of
discussion about that so far.
There are a few other pathologists
who are very creative and are starting,
and are sharing their art and their work.
But I think as a field of pathology,
I'm thinking about how
can we bring more of this
into our field too,
either for our residents, ourselves,
and for that interaction with patients
that many of us enjoy having
and what opportunities lay there.
And I wanna say too
that my experience of sharing my art
was not necessarily an
easy one to start with.
One of the reasons why I started to share
was that I had a few people
that were very supportive of me early on.
And that kind of gave me the courage
to start to be vulnerable
and put myself out there
and then it gets more comfortable.
And one of the reasons I
share is to show people
that it's okay
to put these other aspects
of yourself out there
and that people will be welcoming of it
and actually get excited to see
that you are more than just
a physician or a pathologist.
And that's been really important
to kind of be an example of how to do that
because a couple of people
were able to provide that
initial kind of support for me.
And then hopefully I can pass that on.
And also, I never had
someone earlier in my career
to kind of be an example of that,
that you could also be
a writer, an artist,
so on and so forth.
And that should,
that should also be an important part
of what we talk about in our
lives as healthcare workers.
- Yeah, that's brilliant.
That really resonates with me too.
That's how I think about
my Instagram profile
is I kind of think of right now Twitter
and I guess maybe coming on Threads now
is a little bit more that
straight healthcare professional.
But a lot of times for people
that are interested in
kind of the full person,
Dr. Kreuter is my Instagram account
where I'm showing what
I'm doing as a father,
as an artist, as a physician.
- That's great.
- I know you wanna flip the script on me.
- I do, I do.
I do wanna ask you a question
that you kinda just led into
is that, I've noticed
that you've posted some
about graphic medicine
and I'm very curious
to hear a little bit
more about that from you
and also what your own
interests in art are
'cause it sounds like you have some
that I'm not necessarily aware of.
- Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
So the graphic medicine
started out back several years.
I don't know if that was like
2015-16, somewhere in there.
I went to one of those TEDx conferences
and they were kind of talking
about kind of like the 30-day challenge
of like doing something for 30 days.
And I was there with
another medical educator
that I work with in transfusion
and we were kind of thinking about comics
and wouldn't it be fun to do like comics
because some of those basic principles
of transfusion medicine.
Now certainly, you know,
this is my life's work,
so to say that I can cover it,
comic strip is a little bit
of an existential crisis,
but there's certainly
like bite-sized chunks
that fit well, right?
- Yeah, yeah.
- And so we started doing that.
We called it Transfusion Tunes on Twitter.
We would post and it came at a time
when I had already
started using social media
to like talk about transfusion medicine,
clinically important issues.
But then I noticed
when we put out like
these Transfusion Tunes,
like there was a lot more pickup, right?
So almost like I would
talk about something,
without a sketch or a comic and like,
that would only resonate with
the fellow converted, right?
- The die hard?
- Exactly.
But, you know, I threw
out a Transfusion Tune,
and all of a sudden, like
my colleagues and friends
in critical care medicine
and emergency medicine,
like other people would pick up the topic,
would share it, would comment about it,
sparked more conversation.
It was like, it was one of
these things where I felt
like I'd really stumbled into like, oh,
so this is how I can kind
of have that conversation,
how I can bridge the gap.
And so that's where I've kind
of have seen graphic medicine
really play for me.
But it's a really diverse feel
that we'll put it in the show notes,
but there's a website
of graphicmedicine.org
and they do an annual conference
and it's got attendees or
healthcare professionals.
There's artists, there's
also patients that go
because there's different facets.
There's people like me that are talking
about how do we work amongst each other
as healthcare professionals
to understand interprofessional
collaboration.
There are some people that are interested
in how do we communicate
with patients better, right?
So one of the folks have kind of worked
to create kind of a script and diagram
for talking with families
about end of life issues.
There's also work with
people looking at like, hey,
if we read the graphic novel
about a patient who has
Parkinson's disease,
does that help impact
medical students empathy
for patients with this disease?
As well as is this
something that can be given
to patients who are newly diagnosed?
So it's a diverse field
that might appeal to a
number of our listeners.
- Yeah, no, it's fantastic
and it's really exciting.
I've seen a little bit
of how that can work too.
I am part of a woman's
physician artist group as well
that kind of came about sharing my art.
But one of the artists in that
is a surgeon who works with the children
and has written some children's books
about different surgical procedures
that children might have.
And they're illustrated comic-like books
and they provide a lot of explanation
about what's gonna happen
and has really been,
she thinks has really alleviated
a lot of that anticipation
about what's gonna happen with surgery.
So it's a great tool to
communicate with patients
and part of consent and education as well.
I think that that's awesome.
That's great.
It'll be fun to see where it goes.
And I'm thinking about where can it work
in anatomic pathology a little bit better.
'Cause we're such a
visual field of pathology
that there's so much
there that could happen.
So maybe one of your
listeners will take that on.
- We've been routing with Dr. Tafe
talking about practicing art and medicine.
- Thank you for having me.
It's been a delight.
- And thank you, listeners,
for taking the time to join us.
Today we invite you to share
your thoughts and suggestions
via email to mcleducation@mayo.edu.
If you've enjoyed this podcast,
please subscribe and until
our next rounds together,
we encourage you to continue
to connect lab medicine
and the clinical practice through
educational conversations.
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