ABSTRACT
Medical students can relate to the idea of fragmented medicine and understand the need to remember that Humpty Dumpty was a complex, multilayered whole before he fell. In a clinical encounter, the practitioner needs to keep track of Humpty’s needs as well as their own needs for pattern recognition. And Humpty represents the clinician, teacher, policy writer, employer or leader – each type of practitioner. Humpty represents this whole self, embedded in community, history and environment, who can tell us verbal and embodied stories. The time spent building a relationship with Humpty is a key part of whole person care. An overarching whole person theme directs attention away from ‘fragments’ such as symptoms or behaviours and towards the whole of Humpty’s experience. Speaking the same language as Humpty matters. Similarly, transdisciplinary researchers seek a meaningful common language and ‘a transcendent language – a meta-language – in which the terms of all the participant disciplines are, or can be, expressed’.
