Posts tagged healthcare

Stories Matter Now More than Ever

0 Comments read Blog, Education, Inspirational


This is a time of uncertainty, pain and upheaval. It’s a time of distrust and disinformation on a massive scale, enabled by the easy and instant distribution of social media.

It’s also a time of amazing, heartbreaking and heroic stories.

Last week I got a letter from my friend Eric. He’s a Navy nurse stationed in Spain, one of the areas in Europe hardest-hit by the Coronavirus. He described long hours, uncertainty and even gratitude that he and his family are healthy even while he’s on the front lines of the fight against this disease.

I thanked him for sharing his story with me and wished others could hear it too.

My neice is an ICU nurse in Washington, D.C. I have friends and other family members who are in healthcare. Some of them have also had to deal directly with Covid-19 in their own homes.

We hear these stories, usually second- and third-hand, but more people should hear and see them.

Another friend, Scott, a Chinese medicine practitioner and acupuncturist in Washington State (another Covid hotspot) is dealing with the issue as well.  His staff  voted to remain open to help patients with critical needs during the pandemic, though most clinics have closed, and he’s using savings to keep his staff on payroll. 

Many can relate to these stories, directly or indirectly. But what we can’t do—what we aren’t seeing enough, I think—are the stories of the lives of people on the front lines of this pandemic, both patients and healthcare workers. For safety, logistic and privacy reasons, it’s hard to do. Not impossible, but complicated.

Yet, it’s what we need to be seeing more of. Doctors and patients are behind the curtain—-and we can’t see the battles they encounter nor the significant successes, either. The same is true with other front-line workers, from police officers to rescue personnel to postal workers.

Seeing the real impact on the lives of these people would help everyone to see the costs of the pandemic. We’d see that we all are in this together.

Months from now, when we look back on this time, I hope we have documented these stories. They will remind us of our capacity for solving big problems, and ultimately healing, together.

 

–30–

Dartmouth-Hitchcock Image Library

0 Comments read Assignments, Blog, Client Work, On Location

The best thing about my job as a photographer—aside from the interesting and creative people I get to work with on a daily basis—has to be the cool locations I get to photograph in.

A few months ago, I photographed a project for a large medical advocacy group that involved the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, NH. I’ve photographed hospitals on both coasts but I’ve never seen a medical lab setup like they have at the Laboratory for Clinical Genomics and Advanced Technologies (CGAT)—two wings full of technicians, scientists and analysis equipment.

I finally can show some of the work from that quick—but very intense—shoot, all done while the busy lab remained in full operation:

 

dartmouth medical center

 

 

 

 

A Portrait Of Martin’s Point Healthcare

0 Comments read Blog, Recent Work

healthcare

I can’t think of any other industry that touches everyone’s lives at one point or another like the healthcare industry does.

Not surprising that one of the constant themes of my work over the years has been photographing doctors, nurses and first responders. As a journalist I covered endless procedures, including open-skull brain surgery, in-home hospice and spent nights at hospitals and with paramedic crews.

Now I work for agencies and healthcare providers directly, creating imagery that increasingly focuses on patients and on desired outcomes (instead of showing doctors, show the healthy lives enabled by quality healthcare). It’s a fun challenge. That’s why I was excited to take on a more editorial-style project about Martin’s Point, a Maine based care center located right on Casco Bay.

Instead of focusing on patients, I would focus on the “story” of Martin’s Point–a series of images that speaks to the experience of being there, the environment and the mood of the main clinic. I did photograph some procedures and patient care, but my focus was on the feel of the place, on the caring interactions of providers and even behind-the-scenes images of places where patients don’t normally go. A multi-faceted portrait of healthcare in Maine.

The project was a step back to my editorial roots and a lot of fun. Please check out the complete story on my site to see all of the images.