This is a thorough facilitator’s guide on how to facilitate class discussions on the cross-cultural healthcare documentary Worlds Apart (a detailed summary can be found in the Search for Stories tab). In brief, Worlds Apart is a documentary split into four 10-15 minute sections that each focus on a different cross-cultural health experience, including a Muslim man’s journey with stomach cancer, a Lao woman with a hole in her heart, a Black man waiting for a kidney transplant, and a Puerto Rican woman with diabetes, hypertension, asthma and depression. This documentary showcases narratives that illuminate the limits of Western medicine and expand our ideas of how the American medical system can grow to be more inclusive, equitable, and sensitive.
The facilitator’s guide provides background on the filmmakers and their intentions. It includes suggestions for facilitators such as setting ground rules for discussion and asking students to jot down notes during the documentary. The four-part narrative-driven documentary is summarized, and then each section is broken down in great detail, so even someone who did not watch the film could understand the exact circumstances of each family and individual being featured. After each synopsis we also receive medical background information and a variety of discussion questions specifically tailored to different issues discussed in the stories. Each section has a separate “focus” also outlined, ranging from language barriers to explanatory modules to informed consent to racial/ethnic healthcare disparities to non-adherence to medications. This guide was created “to give health care professionals an engaging experience through which to explore ideas about cross-cultural issues in health care and to learn from the actual experiences of both patients and clinicians,” but could also easily be adapted to a university classroom setting to guide student discussions. The guide does not include any assignments, but any of the issues headlining the discussion topics could work well as research essay prompts.
Access
- Link: https://workforcesummit.ucsf.edu/sites/g/files/tkssra1166/f/Green_worlds_apart_guide_ll.pdf
Details
Language: English
Type of Teaching Material: Discussion Questions, Lesson Plan/Discussion Outline, Class Exercise/Activity, and Background for instructor
Setting (class level or workshop): Community, Graduate, Professional, and Undergraduate
Contributed by: Rosalie Zuckermann
Citation:
Green, A.; Betancourt, J.; Carrillo J. Emilio. Worlds Apart Facilitator’s Guide. [pdf]. Stanford University Center for Biomedical Ethics