Femi Oyebode: Poetry in medicine
BMJ 2017; 357 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.j2452 (Published 24 May 2017) Cite this as: BMJ 2017;357:j2452
Biography
Femi Oyebode is professor of psychiatry at Birmingham University and a published poet. He studied medicine at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, and came to the UK in 1979, completing his higher training at Newcastle. He chose psychiatry because it is the medical discipline that comes closest to the humanities, he says, requiring “thinking, listening to people, and a degree of wisdom.” A would-be writer, he was cajoled into medicine by his father and has successfully combined poetry and psychiatry: he is author of Sims’ Symptoms in the Mind (5th edition) and seven books of poetry, including Master of the Leopard Hunt (1996). In 2016 he received a lifetime achievement award from the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
What was your earliest ambition?
To be a writer, a poet. I’ve managed to combine a career in medicine with writing, even though the writing has had to take a back seat. You could say that I’m the opposite of Chekhov, who also managed to combine medicine and literature—but in his case medicine took a back seat.
What was your best career move?
Moving to train as a psychiatrist in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1980, where I worked with outstanding clinicians such as Allan Kerr, Hamish McClelland, and Kurt Schapira. In the early ‘80s Newcastle was the place to train in psychiatry outside London. My cohort included Ian McKeith, Jan Scott, and others who went on to make important contributions.
What was the worst mistake in your career?
Thankfully, none so far.
How is your work-life balance?
Reasonable. You could say that all of my pursuits feed psychiatry and literature. So the distinction between work and life isn’t sharply drawn, and there’s a creative tension that helps. It doesn’t sound like much of a balance, but it suits me.
How do you keep fit and healthy?
Cycling to work, and running at weekends.
What single change would you like to see made to the NHS?
An NHS independent of politics and government, like the Bank of England or the BBC.
What do you wish that you had known when you were younger?
Life is not a rehearsal for a future performance.
Do doctors get paid enough?
Yes.
To whom would you most like to apologise?
My extended family in Lagos, for living abroad and hence missing most family events. Little is said about the effects of migration in the modern world—how do we define identity, determine what a first language is, or decide where to be buried? These issues will multiply in the next century. People like me are at the vanguard of these extraordinary demographic changes and the inevitable breakdown of national boundaries as we know them—Brexit notwithstanding.
What do you usually wear to work?
Not a suit.
What living doctor do you most admire, and why?
Ken Davison, for his encyclopaedic knowledge of neuropsychiatry and his clinical acumen. He read over 3000 papers and quoted about 2000 in his landmark review of the organic diseases associated with schizophrenia, and he was kind enough to supervise my MD thesis. Also, Ian Brockington, who is the reason I’m at Birmingham. His scholarship, intellectual rigour, and independence of thought have been a source of inspiration. These are rare gifts in medicine.
What is the worst job you have done?
Working in an out-of-the-way asylum in the late ’70s.
What single change has made the most difference in your field in your lifetime?
Functional neuroimaging of brain function: its value in clinical psychiatry is yet to be established. Viewing functional brain images in real time was one of my most astonishing experiences, somewhat akin to watching 3D film for the first time. It’s strange how quickly one becomes accustomed to truly remarkable experiences.
What new technology or development are you most looking forward to?
Combining functional neuroimaging and artificial intelligence systems as diagnostic tools in psychiatry. The singular problem in psychiatry is the absence of independent markers of disease. In my view, this simply reflects the complexity of brain processes, especially those disrupted in psychiatric disorders. None of this should be surprising, since psychiatry deals with the most human attributes of brain function—the capacity to form intentions, model the world, predict events, establish and sustain relationships, and regulate powerful emotions while putting them to fruitful use. It’s easy not to recognise these attributes as properties of the brain. None of this denies the importance of language, culture, and social constructs. Given the complexities involved in psychiatry, it seems to me that non-human, artificial intelligence capable of making calculations and analysis, beyond what we’re normally capable of, will be required in diagnostic decision making.
What book should every doctor read?
Anton Chekhov’s short stories—especially Ward No 6, for psychiatrists.
What is your guiltiest pleasure?
Gourmet coffee from Ethiopia.
Where are or were you happiest?
Being present at the birth of both of my children.
What television programmes do you like?
David Suchet in Poirot.
What personal ambition do you still have?
To write a few more books, volumes of poetry, and academic texts.
Summarise your personality in three words
Diligent, introspective, and perhaps pessimistic.
What is your pet hate?
Jeremy Hunt, for taking pride in defeating junior doctors and demoralising young doctors. And for the not so surreptitious chronic underfunding of the NHS, which is likely to lead to the collapse of the greatest social invention of the 20th century.
What would be on the menu for your last supper?
Jollof rice, fried giant land snails (Lissachatina fulica) in hot chilli sauce, and fresh palm wine.
What poem, song, or passage of prose would you like mourners at your funeral to hear?
Probably a poem, written by me but chosen by family.
Is the thought of retirement a dream or a nightmare?
Nightmare!
If you weren’t in your present position what would you be doing instead?
Travelling in the footsteps of Ibn Battuta (1304-68), the great Moroccan traveller born in Tangiers. I fancy recreating his journey through west Africa, taking in Fez (Morocco), Timbuktu, Gao, Djenne (Mali), Kano, and Borno (Nigeria) and writing a travelogue of the trip. These stages of Battuta’s travels are less well known than those through north Africa, the Middle East, central Europe, India, and China.
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