Medical illustration in the UK: Its current and potential role in medical education

Headnote

This paper describes how medical illustration has evolved to become increasingly important in undergraduate medical education, postgraduate medical education and continuing medical education, as new technologies have become available and new teaching methods have developed based on the emerging technologies. It also examines how the role of the medical illustrator has changed. The descriptor 'medical illustration' fails to reflect the changing face of the profession and it is suggested that a new title is required to convey better the evolving role of the profession.

Introduction

The British term 'medical illustration' apparently means much the same as the North American term 'biomedical communications', yet the differences in the meanings of the two terms do give rise to confusion. Whilst the profession has changed, the description and terminology within the United Kingdom (UK) has not. Over the last decade, information technology has entered medicine and promises to revolutionize the field of education.1 The new age of information technology and digital communication is here to stay and the medical illustrator has to harness the tools of new media and technology to provide for the demands of the clients and the challenges of medicine and its teaching. Therefore, the authors believe that there is a need to re-evaluate the medical illustrator's role in medical education.

Terminology

The average person is surprised that, within the UK, the term ,medical illustration', besides drawing, also includes photography, television and audiovisual technology. 2 Morton has expressed the concern that very often medical illustrators leave the questioner confused as to what exactly they do. 3 This is understandable, since, as Hansell explains:

... we have experienced a change of emphasis from the 'medical artist' to the 'clinical photographer' to the 'medical illustrator'; we have seen 'visual aids' give way to 'audiovisual aids' only to be successively ousted by 'educational technology' and 'communication' in medical and biological education.4

In recognition of their involvement in broader fields of media than pure 'medical illustration', the Institute of Medical Illustrator's journal changed from Medical and Biological Illustration (M&BI) to the Journal of Audiovisual Media in Medicine (JAMM) in 1977. Morton, then editor of M&BI, explained that the new title:

... was arrived at with some difficulty as there was no simple expression (other than the American...