Lecture, performances to cover ethics in medicine, research

GREENVILLE, N.C.   —   A lecture on medical experimentation on slaves and performances of medical-related short stories will be presented during February and March by the Department of Medical Humanities at East Carolina University.

The department, part of the Brody School of Medicine, will host Dr. L. Lewis Wall of Washington University in St Louis as he presents “Medical Experimentation in the Slave South: J. Marion Sims and the Vasico-Vaginal Fistula.” Sims is known as the father of American gynecology; however, historians note that much of his research was conducted on slaves. Wall will speak Feb. 11 at 12:30 p.m. in Room 2W-40B of the Brody Medical Sciences Building.

The department will also host several Readers’ Theater adaptations of two short stories by Richard Selzer, “Sarcophagus” and “Witness.” The performances, told from the perspective of a surgeon, will take viewers inside a surgeon’s head in the operating room and out of it. They will see the surgeon deal with surprises during surgery, operating room staff and families before and after the procedures. A discussion follows each performance.

Readers’ Theater is performed by students of the Brody School of Medicine and ECU College of Nursing.

Performances will be Sunday, Feb. 1, at 10:30 a.m. at Unitarian Universalist Congregation, 131 Oakmont Drive, Greenville; Feb. 18 at 7:30 p.m. at ECU’s Mendenhall Student Center Room 14; Feb. 25 at 7 p.m. at Barton College in Wilson; and March 5 and 19 at 5:15 p.m. at the ECU College of Nursing, Health Sciences Building Room 1102.

For more information, call the Department of Medical Humanities at 744-2797 or Dorothy Rentschler at 744-6382.