MHSNJ Zoom Program (Kent Memorial Lecture)—Tuesday, January 21, 2025

Speaker:  Mindy Schwartz, MD

Topic:  “The Medicine of History: Clinical-Historical Connections”

Abstract

Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin was an eighteenth-century French physician and social reformer who was opposed to the death penalty.  While his name is firmly linked to the historical execution device commonly known as the guillotine, he neither invented it nor perfected it.  Why, then, is his name so closely associated with this infamous practice?  Placing this fact in its appropriate historical context can potentially enliven the study of medical history and act as a conduit for exploration of the social and political dimensions of medicine and medical practice. 

Moreover, because the foundational part of clinical medical education is the case-based approach, one’s own clinical experience has the potential to invite exploration of historical precedents.  The more interesting or unusual the case is, the greater is its potential for one’s active engagement in medical history.

This talk will illustrate how my memorable experience with a patient who had Ludwig’s angina launched me into a career studying and teaching medical history to students, residents, and interested lay audiences.  I will show how this approach to an appreciation of history can help to create better clinicians.  

About the speaker 

Mindy Schwartz, MD is a practicing internist and Professor of Medicine in the Section of General Medicine at the University of Chicago.  Dr. Schwartz graduated from Cornell University in Ithaca, NY with a degree in nutrition and biochemistry.  She obtained her MD degree from Loyola University, Stritch School of Medicine, in Chicago, and completed her internship and residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

Dr. Schwartz joined the faculty at the University of Chicago in 1987, where she has remained for the last 37 years.  In addition to maintaining a busy clinical practice, Dr. Schwartz has held a variety of positions in the medical school and in the internal medicine residency program, including Associate Program Director for the Department of Medicine and Chair of the Internship Selection Committee.

After teaching nutrition to the Pritzker medical students and residents for many years, Dr. Schwartz has, for the past ten years, studied and taught medical history, describing it as her “true passion.”  

An award-winning teacher, Dr. Schwartz was elected in 2010 as a Master of the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine Academy of Distinguished Medical Educators.  She has been a chapter advisor for the Gold Humanism Honor Society and a long-term medical student advisor for the Pritzker School of Medicine.  She is an active member of the American Association for the History of Medicine, an organization celebrating its centennial year in 2025!