Reweaving Clinical Compassion: Integrating Medical Humanities and Narrative Medicine in Contemporary Healthcare Education

Abstract

The accelerating pace of medical technology and standardized clinical procedures has altered the traditional physician–patient dynamic, leading to a growing divide between scientific rationality and humanistic concern in modern health care. In response to this imbalance, the integration of medical humanities and narrative medicine has emerged as a promising pathway to restore empathy, enhance communication, and strengthen professional identity among medical practitioners. This paper reviews the historical foundations and conceptual evolution of medical humanities, and analyzes the global trajectory of narrative medicine as a pedagogical and clinical approach. Drawing on recent educational reform trends, the study identifies the structural challenges that hinder the implementation of humanistic curricula in medical training, including fragmented course design, limited interdisciplinary collaboration, and insufficient assessment frameworks. It then proposes strategies for integrating narrative-based reflective learning, cross-disciplinary curricular models, and competency-oriented evaluation systems into medical education. The paper argues that the deep integration of medical humanities and narrative medicine is crucial for cultivating physicians who are not only clinically competent but also capable of ethical reasoning, emotional resonance, and patient-centered care. Ultimately, such integration represents a pathway toward transforming health care into a practice marked by both precision and compassion.