If you walk the halls of Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, you may have already noticed the new artwork lining the walls outside the Carroll Auditorium and the resident workroom in the Cardiac Progressive Unit (P4531). These photographs, taken by Dr. Vivian V. Altiery De Jesus, junior resident in the Bayview Internal Medicine Residency Program, go a long way in brightening the formerly blank walls where they now reside.
Dr. Altiery De Jesus is a member of the Health Humanities Track led by Drs. Kamna Balhara (Emergency Medicine) and Rachel Salas (Neurology). The track has allowed her to explore multiple venues to connect humanities and healthcare and led her to incorporate photography into her work. Encouraged by her mentors, she participated in the Office of Well-Being’s H.O.P.E. Photo Contest where she was selected as a winner and featured along with her photos on their website. She then graciously donated her work, with printing and framing costs sponsored by the Office of Arts, Humanities and Health and the Department of Medicine, to be displayed in the hospital. She hopes showcasing these photos will bring the grounding and healing properties of nature into the hospital and engage patients and staff in the health humanities. “Although ever-changing, nature provides an anchor to a thread of hope,” she says. “Spring is spring and regardless of pandemic or not, it will always arrive.”
