title: [The importance of literature in medical humanities].
abstract: This article emphasizes on the importance of including literature as a subject in the medical curriculum and particularly in the teaching of medical humanities. It underlines the importance of the physician-writer and the non-physician writer, who may become patients at the same time, justifying why to include this subject in teaching medicine. Finally, the article suggests four steps to create a course in this field: text selection, definition of the content, time of inclusion within the curriculum, and distancing as a methodological strategy.
authors.affiliation: Programa de Ciencias Sociosanitarias y Humanidades Médicas, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, España. bioetica_reproductiva@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Jorge Alberto
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Alvarez-Díaz
mesh_terms: D004501:Education, Medical; D006809:Humanities; D008091:Literature