Background

The UNLV Health Sciences Library (HSL) primarily supports the education and mission of the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine (KKSOM) students, faculty and staff. We currently have a small collection of fewer than 200 print titles that fall into leisure reading and health humanities genres, including graphic medicine titles. The KKSOM curriculum and mission have always been community-focused, and in the past year new emphasis on biases, racism and cultural humility have emerged as learning priorities. The KKSOM students have formed several identity-oriented clubs, including those for women, LGBTQ+, Asian Pacific, Latino/a, and Middle Eastern and South Asian medical students.

Numerous studies on narrative medicine programs within medical education and training have documented the positive effects on empathy, patient care, and patient outcomes that reading and studying stories can have. Providing a collection of novels that tell stories from diverse perspectives not only supports the curriculum and the development of skills such as active listening, diagnosis and empathetic communication, but also provide a needed break from work and study to improve mental health.