Medical Humanities
Where decision-making meets care.
WHAT
Focus
The Medical Humanities represent an interdisciplinary field that connects medicine with the human experience, integrating perspectives from psychology, ethics, philosophy, sociology, and communication sciences. This area explores how patients and clinicians make choices under uncertainty and emotional pressure, and how personal, cognitive, and social factors influence the care process. By linking biomedical science with behavioral and cognitive insight, students learn to view healthcare as an interaction between evidence, emotion, and meaning.
HOW
Approach
Learning combines seminars, workshops, and interdisciplinary research projects across medicine, psychology, and the humanities. Students explore topics such as bioethics, health communication, cognitive and behavioral sciences, narrative medicine, and decision-making theory. Through exposure to both clinical practice and applied research, they develop the ability to analyze the cognitive, psychological, and behavioral dimensions of health and illness—fostering empathy, ethical awareness, and patient empowerment.
WHERE
Environment
The area is powered by the European Institute of Oncology (IEO), where psychology, behavioral science, and clinical research converge to advance a psycho-cognitive approach to medicine. The Division promotes a multidisciplinary model that combines biological and medical data with cognitive, psychological, and behavioral profiling, with the goal of personalizing care and strengthening the doctor–patient relationship.
Within the broader SEMM network, students collaborate with researchers, clinicians, and ethicists committed to rethinking healthcare through the lens of human experience—creating a stimulating environment where science meets society.
WHO
People
This area is ideal for students interested in understanding the human and psychological dimensions of medicine—those who want to connect data-driven science with empathy, reflection, and ethical responsibility. Graduates emerge ready to contribute to research, healthcare innovation, communication, and policy, where medical decision-making and human understanding come together to improve patient care and well-being.