{"id":157616,"date":"2025-03-19T09:32:28","date_gmt":"2025-03-19T13:32:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=157616"},"modified":"2025-03-19T15:26:12","modified_gmt":"2025-03-19T19:26:12","slug":"traveling-chalkboard-inspires-wright-state-medical-students-to-discuss-death-and-dying","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2025\/03\/19\/traveling-chalkboard-inspires-wright-state-medical-students-to-discuss-death-and-dying\/","title":{"rendered":"Traveling chalkboard inspires Wright State medical students to discuss death and dying"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the past week, an interactive exhibit has sparked deep reflection among medical students at Wright State University\u2019s Boonshoft School of Medicine<\/a>. The large four-sided chalkboard on wheels, placed prominently in the lobby of White Hall, encouraged students to answer the question: What do you want to do before you die?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a topic I think about a lot,\u201d said Ryan Parker, a first-year medical student who wrote about his desire to visit all seven continents before he dies.<\/p>\n

The exercise is part of On Death and Dying, The Last Taboo Subject in America, an elective course introduced for fourth-year medical students this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe time to have conversations with patients is not in the ICU,\u201d said Kelly Rabah, Ed.D., assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology and geriatrics.<\/p>\n

Rabah said the course allows her to discuss how students can offer hope to their patients at the end of their lives.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe the hope they get home and they can die in their own bed or they hope they can be with their grandkids or their pets,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The inspiration for the traveling chalkboard came from a TED Talk presented in Chronic Illness and End of Life, a special topic in communication course at Wright State.<\/p>\n

Marie Thompson, Ph.D., professor of communication<\/a>, said the project is a great way to discuss end-of-life care with her students.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery word choice that you put on the wall is a way of talking about the life you want to live and how you want to be,\u201d said Thompson.<\/p>\n

The elective course is specifically designed for fourth-year medical students who will start residency training after graduating in May. It has been wildly popular and is already full for the 2025 fall semester.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs future physicians, we are going to be talking about death a lot,\u201d said fourth-year medical student Shayna Mehta. \u201cI think it\u2019s important to have the wall here for first- and second-year medical students to start to think about this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An interactive exhibit sparked deep reflection among Wright State medical students, encouraging them to answer the question: What do you want to do before you die? Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":157619,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,729,725,727,747,2149,2016,715,4855,720],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-157616","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-around-campus","category-home-news-sidebar","category-homepage-photos-and-video","category-liberal-arts","category-medical-students","category-medicine","category-news","category-social-sciences-and-international-studies","category-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157616","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157616"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157616\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":157675,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157616\/revisions\/157675"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157616"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157616"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157616"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}