A couple months ago, I was nervously awaiting a response from a research fellowship I applied to and expressed some of my anxiety to a fellow premed friend. I explained that my project was not the typical biomedical wet lab research you’d expect from a premed student, but an ethnography on how healing is experienced in traditional Chinese medicine. They responded with a polite, “That’s cool,” but their hesitation was humorously unmistakable; after a pause, they added that, in their experience, nothing would ever beat “real” medicine.

This idea of “real” medicine admittedly makes sense. Biomedicine and the scientific method transformed emergency medicine, pioneered cancer treatments, and created various life-saving interventions that were previously unimaginable. 

However, while STEM subjects are fundamental to medicine, their emphasis on objectivity is not enough. Medicine is not about instructing a patient on a singular, clinically correct way to heal, but instead about balancing the doctor’s expertise as a physician with the patient’s expertise on their own life. Here at UC San Diego, we have thousands of premed students that will become the next generation of physicians. Embracing the humanities and social sciences allows us to move beyond seeing medicine as a monolith and become truly compassionate healers.

Medicine is not just a practice of science; it is also a social practice. In an interview with The UCSD Guardian, Dr. Megha Shankar, the associate chief health equity officer at UC San Diego Health, this point became glaringly critical. Shankar described a Fijian Hindu priest she encountered during her medical training who had enough of his feeding tube and “just wanted to drink his chai.” The priest was aspirating; instead of going down his digestive tract, food would enter his airway and lungs, risking serious infection. The clinically correct next steps called for a stomach tube and zero oral feeding. However, the patient did not want to die with a tube going from his nose to his stomach. Eventually, Shankar removed the priest’s tube, and he was able to drink his long-awaited chai. 

Here, we see how medical care often has more to do with existentialism than biomolecules. From a purely biological lens, taking out the feeding tube greatly increased the patient’s mortality and was therefore objectively wrong. From a more nuanced perspective, we see a man who had already lived a full life and wasn’t interested in extending it with decreased autonomy. Medical decision-making is about the person, not the disease. 

Not only does focusing solely on biological outcomes overlook a patient’s self-determination, but objectivity also forces us into believing singular truths that can narrow our perspectives and erase the nuances of healing that are exceedingly relevant in medicine and health outcomes.

For example, one of Shankar’s patients has had to turn to a compounded GLP-1 medication in response to its skyrocketing cost. Of course, Shankar strictly and strongly advises against the use of non-FDA-approved drugs. However, she acknowledges these realities rather than dismissing them as noncompliance. Shankar fosters trust and gathers more meaningful information, which ultimately allows for better communication between patient and physician, leading to more effective care. 

Physicians can see the results of their patients’ blood tests and somatic symptoms, but they can’t see their socioeconomic status, where they live, their education level, their cultural practices, and all of the other factors that research shows actually contribute to health outcomes more than genetics or biology. 

Classes like SOCI 137: Sociology of Food illustrate how the benefits cliff can leave diabetic patients without access to proper nutrition, making it difficult to manage their condition despite medical advice. Similarly, in ANSC 152: Social Justice in South Asia, students examine how pesticides in Indian farms harm rural populations who have no choice but to eat carcinogenic food. For future physicians, engaging with these concrete examples deepens our understanding of health beyond a biomedical perspective, which is crucial to becoming well-rounded medical practitioners. 

Taking a strictly scientific approach to medicine is arguably dehumanizing. Healing and health are not only governed by genetics, chemistry, and biology; practicing medicine is not just about knowing symptoms and reading charts. Shankar’s anecdotes show how all patients are their own experts and how their health is deeply intertwined with policies and social structures. In our journey to medical school, it’s crucial to not alienate the social sciences and humanities, as they will only make us more compassionate and effective doctors.