Mindfulness In Medicine

This is the companion blog for the UCSD Medical School elective course “PSY238 Mindfulness in Medicine: Stress Reduction, Awareness and Healing”. As the teacher for this course, I will be posting my own observations of the experience and invite the students to share their own input as the class unfolds. Students are asked to submit three journal entries over the course of the 8-week class, demonstrating that they are engaging with the material and sharing their own journey’s toward learning what is offered in the class. They are invited to share those journal entries on this blog if they feel comfortable doing so. My experience in previous iterations of this class has been that these are rare and valuable glimpses into the process that the students go through in exposing themselves to mindfulness practice, many of them for the first time.

The class itself is built around an adapted version of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, in which the students experience key aspects of MBSR on a weekly basis and are asked to engage in a daily formal mindfulness practice as part of their “homework” for the course. They are also given various reading assignments relevant to the connection between mindfulness and the practice of medicine.

If you are not a member of this class, you are invited to peruse the entries and perhaps offer your comments, questions or observations, as long as they are in the spirit in which this blog is offered. It is our hope that this will be of value for all who participate, in whatever form.