Stigma Toward Bipolar Disorder Among Psychiatry Residents: A Pilot Study Utilizing Narrative Medicine and a Video Vignette

Abstract

Stigma toward mental illness has been extensively described among health care professionals and has important implications with respect to quality of care. Narrative medicine has the potential to bring about positive impacts on the practitioner-patient relationship and on patient outcomes. The authors carried out a pilot study investigating the impact of narrative medicine on residents’ stigma toward bipolar disorder.

Psychiatry residents attended four narrative medicine workshops. During the encounters, the residents watched a video vignette displaying stigma-related experiences and life challenges faced by a standardized patient with bipolar disorder and were encouraged to discuss their personal reactions, opinions, and other reflections prompted by the video vignette, as well as to write reflective pieces on the content mobilized by the discussion. Stigma toward mental illnesses was measured through the Mental Illness: Clinicians’ Attitudes Scale-Version 4 (MICA v4).

A total of 22 psychiatry residents attended the four narrative medicine workshops. Overall, the activity was well received by the residents. There was a small, non-significant decline in the pre- and post-activity MICA v4 scores among residents.

The findings demonstrate the feasibility of implementing narrative medicine workshops for psychiatry residents and highlight the need for further studies with larger samples and a control group to evaluate its impact on stigma.