Ami Walsh has been a writer-in-residence with the Gifts of Art Program at Michigan Medicine since 2012. She currently works at North Star Reach, a year-round camp that serves children with serious illnesses and their families, and where (among her many roles) she directs an audio storytelling program for campers. She earned an MFA in creative writing from Warren Wilson College and has been awarded fellowships at the Ragdale Foundation, Banff Arts Centre, Vermont Studio Center, and the Ox-Bow School of Art for her fiction.
Authors Ami Walsh, MFA, Jeffrey Evans, PhD, and colleagues describe how digital technology is being used to create patient-centered audio stories in a dynamic program at Michigan Medicine. Audio storytelling, they report, helps to honor a patient’s sense of self and offer comfort and hope.