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Air Dates: August 19-25, 2024

We know healthcare means hospitals and stethoscopes, and x-rays, and bloodwork, and prescriptions. But Dr. Dean-David Schillinger says stories are the key to healthcare—both our willingness to tell them; and our caregiver’s ability to listen and understand them.

Schillinger is a primary care physician, scientist, author, and public health advocate. He has served as chief of the UCSF Division of General Internal Medicine at San Francisco General Hospital, and chief of the Diabetes Prevention and Control Program for the California Department of Public Health.  He is an internationally recognized expert in health communication and has been widely recognized for his work related to improving the health of marginalized populations.  Schillinger is credited with a number of discoveries in primary care and health communication and is considered a pioneer of the field of health literacy. He is the inaugural recipient of the Andrew B. Bindman Professorship in Primary Care and Health Policy at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF).

On this episode of “Story in the Public Square,” Schillinger discusses his book, “Telltale Hearts: A Public Health Doctor, His Patients, and the Power of Story,” which offers a unique perspective on public health issues in America through the lens of patients and providers in the country’s public hospitals.  He says, “I think we have the misconception that illness happens because of the poor choices we make as individuals, but I think what the book shows quite compellingly is that illness happens because of a series of exposures over the course of a life that are unhealthy and accumulate, whether that’s secondhand smoke, or violence in the neighborhood, or food insecurity, or other kinds of health risks.”  He underscores the importance of understanding patients’ social context that has led them to the hospital and the ways social factors influence outcomes.

“Story in the Public Square” broadcasts each week on public television stations across the United States. In Rhode Island and southeastern New England, the show is broadcast on Rhode Island PBS on Sundays at 11:00 a.m. and is rebroadcast Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. Check your local public television listings for air times near you! An audio version of the program airs Saturdays at 8:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. ET, Sundays at 5:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. and Mondays at 2:30 a.m. ET on SiriusXM’s popular P.O.T.U.S. (Politics of the United States), channel 124. “Story in the Public Square” is a project of the Pell Center at ������. The initiative aims to study, celebrate and tell stories that matter.