2025: THE FIRST *ADVANCED* INTERNATIONAL MEDICAL IMPROV TRAIN-THE-TRAINER WORKSHOP

Hosted by the Center for Bioethics & Medical Humanities of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in downtown Chicago, this year’s workshop is only open to people who completed the original Northwestern Train-the-Trainer course (2013-2024).

Friday, August 29 at 1pm – Sunday, August 31, 2025 at 3pm

Location

Northwestern’s Feinberg School of Medicine campus is located in the heart of Chicago near the city’s best museums, theaters, and shopping. The address of our main classroom building is 303 E Superior St, Chicago, IL 60611.

Flights

Chicago is served by two airports, O’Hare and Midway. The airports are on opposite sides of the city (north & south) but each is roughly the same distance from downtown. You can take public transportation downtown (the “el” (elevated) train) from either airport.

Hotels

The following hotels are within close walking distance of the workshop location. Please be sure to identify yourself as a guest of Northwestern University when booking, and you may receive discounted rates or other offers (like free wifi).

• Omni Chicago Hotel

• Hyatt Centric Chicago Magnificent Mile

• DoubleTree by Hilton, Chicago MagMile

• Warwick Allerton Hotel Chicago

• Hotel EMC2

• Aloft Chicago Mag Mile

The format and schedule of the typical Train-the-Trainer Workshop (as listed below) does not apply this year. Please watch for further details.

2026: THE ELEVENTH INTERNATIONAL MEDICAL IMPROV TRAIN-THE-TRAINER WORKSHOP

Open to all who have not taken the original course before, and will resume in summer 2026. Hosted by the Center for Bioethics & Medical Humanities of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in downtown Chicago

SUMMER 2026 DATES TBA

2026 registration rates have not yet been set, but for reference, at the 10th annual Train-the-Trainer workshop the standard registration fee was $1,495 and a discounted rate of $595 was available for actors and full-time students who are not supported by their institution.

Improvisational theatre skills have a surprising and substantial overlap with the communication skills required of medical professionals. This insight led Workshop Director & Instructor Katie Watson to create an innovative “medical improv” course at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine in 2002, which adapted improvisational theater principles and training techniques to build clinician communication skills with patients and colleagues, and to enhance cognition and teamwork in medicine.

Participants in the 2019 Train-the-Trainer workshop will spend five days in Chicago taking Watson’s 10-hour medical improv course. Improv class size will be small (12–14 students) to allow individual feedback. These groups will come together every day for didactic teaching in which all will learn how to teach Watson's course, and on the last day participants will practice teaching medical improv exercises themselves. Participants will also learn about other adaptations and applications of medical improv for residents and practicing clinicians. Participants will share their own expertise and goals in this area, and receive feedback and support for their future teaching plans. Participants will leave with an introduction to medical improv, a network of potential collaborators, and the skills and knowledge to begin creating a medical improv course that makes sense in the context of their own institutions, audiences, and roles.

(For more information on medical improv at Northwestern see Watson K. Serious Play: Teaching Medical Skills with Improvisational Theater Techniques. Acad Med. 2011;86:1260–1265. link)

Who is eligible to register for this workshop?

This workshop trains people to teach medical improv. It is designed to serve people working in medicine with a variety of backgrounds and medical education or training roles. Examples include:

• Physicians, nurses, and other medical professionals with limited or no improv experience who want to learn how to teach medical improv with a theater professional as a co-teacher.

• Improvisers or theater professionals with limited or no medical background who want to learn how to teach medical improv with a medical professional as a co-teacher.

• Standardized patients who want to learn a medical improv curriculum they could teach by themselves.

• Physicians and other medical professionals who also have improv experience who want to learn a medical improv curriculum they could teach by themselves.

• Other professionals working in medical environments with teaching responsibilities, such as those in ethics or the medical humanities.

Note: This workshop is not geared toward for-profit communication consultants. If you fall into this category and are interested in this work or training, email katie watson to discuss the options.

Workshop structure

1. Experiential Workshop

   • Days 1-4: Workshop participants will take the 5-session (10 hour) “Playing Doctor” medical improv course Prof. Watson created for Northwestern-Feinberg medical students and has taught successfully for over ten years. Each session will be followed by a “how to teach this” debriefing and discussion, and a detailed exercise guide will be handed out.

   • Day 5: Participants will put their new knowledge into practice by teaching medical improv exercises. Your practice teaching will be supervised by the Instructors, and you will receive feedback from your students and the instructor.

2. Collaboration and Development

   • Expertise Exchanges: One or more sessions will feature short presentations by participants on how they’ve used improv in medical settings, and presentations by the instructors on how they’ve used medical improv in multiple contexts (eg residents/fellows, senior clinicians, interdisciplinary groups, ethics consultants).

   • Future Directions Discussions: There will be ample opportunity for participants to share their own contexts, and to brainstorm how they might modify existing medical improv ideas and practices to fit their own institutions, audiences, and goals.

3. “Field Research”

   • One evening will be spent seeing a Chicago improv show together.

Course DiRecTor

Katie Watson, JD is an Associate Professor at Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, where she is an award-winning teacher of medical humanities, bioethics, and constitutional law. In 2002 Professor Watson integrated her expertise in medicine and improv to create a 10-hour improv course for Feinberg medical students, which she’s been teaching as a selective ever since. (She began studying and performing improv in 1997, and she was faculty at Chicago’s Second City Training Center 2008-15.) In 2011 Professor Watson originated the term “medical improv” in her Academic Medicine article about her work, and in 2013 she taught the nation’s first Medical Improv Train-the-Trainer Workshop. Her novel communications curriculum is now taught in medical schools and other health care training settings across the country, it was featured in the AAMC’s 2020 publication “The Fundamental Role of the Arts and Humanities in Medical Education,” and Professor Watson has presented keynote lectures, grand rounds, and workshops on medical improv for trainees and clinicians at medical schools, hospitals, and conferences across the country. | Contact: k-watson@northwestern.edu

2024 Instructors

Lauren Dowden, MSW, LCSW is a clinical social worker at the Mesulam Center for Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, where she provides clinical care to individuals and families who are navigating a dementia diagnosis. Lauren supports the research, coordination and facilitation of ongoing quality of life programs and care partner support groups. Lauren developed the Mesulam Center’s storytelling workshop, Don’t Look Away: Using Storytelling to Give Voice, Find Connections, and Change Perceptions, which invited individuals with dementia and their care partner to co-create a story about their lived experience, which were featured on the Today Show, WTTW’s Chicago Tonight and in The New York Times. Lauren holds a Master of Social Work degree from Loyola University Chicago specializing in mental health with a gerontology sub-specialization and a BA in Theater Arts from Pennsylvania State University. She is an alumna of improv/sketch comedy theatres The Second City and Boom Chicago [Amsterdam] with 20+ years of experience performing and teaching improvisation and sketch comedy. Lauren is a Medical Improv instructor having taught medical students and healthcare professionals around the country, notably at Northwestern University, Northwestern Medicine, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, and UCLA. Lauren has also developed therapeutic improv curricula for populations navigating substance use disorders, trauma, anxiety, Parkinson’s disease, and major neurocognitive disorders.

Nilesh Shah, PhD is an Assistant Professor at the School of Dental Medicine and School of Public Health at University of Pittsburgh, where he teaches biostatistics, medical improv, and facilitates standardized patient sessions. He also collaborates on several research projects related to oral health and public health. Nilesh is a 2006 graduate of The Second City-Detroit Conservatory and writing programs and has performed improv regularly for 20 years, participating in improv and comedy festivals around the country. He also serves on the board of directors at Arcade Comedy Theater in Pittsburgh and previously served as the programming director of the Pittsburgh Comedy Festival. Nilesh attended the Medical Improv Train-the-Trainer Workshop in 2016 and has been teaching medical improv to dental students, pharmacy students, and faculty ever since. He presented a talk titled, “Improvisational Theater: Techniques for Improving Communication, Confidence and Empathy“ at the American Dental Education Association (ADEA) in 2017. He serves on the steering committee of the Medical Improv Collaborate (MIC) and actively participates in its research ensemble. Nilesh received his BS at Case Western Reserve University and his PhD in Biostatistics at University of Pittsburgh.

Briana Tierno, DMH completed her doctorate in Medical Humanities at Drew University in Spring 2024. Her current research with medical residents at Tampa General Hospital, Tampa, FL focuses on using experiential practices such as improvisation, narrative writing, and meditation to enhance self-awareness in practitioners and assist them in building a deeper connection with their patients. She currently serves as the Learning and Development Facilitator at University of South Florida College of Medicine, Department of Experiential Learning and Simulation. With a BA in Theatre Arts, Briana began providing Med Improv workshops for USF Health in 2015. Her learners include 1st and 3rd year medical students, PA students, medical faculty, and residents at Tampa General Hospital. She was the first Acting Lead of the Medical Improv Collaborative (MIC) which was founded in 2019 and served in that role until July 2022.

Amy Zelenski, PhD is an Associate Professor and Director of Education Innovation and Scholarship in the Department of Medicine at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. She received her Masters and PhD in Education from the University of Wisconsin after completing her Bachelors in Drama and Psychology from the University of Washington. She designs curriculum and teaches improv, communication, empathy, teamwork, teaching, and self-awareness skills to medical professionals. Amy’s research focuses on teaching healthcare professionals how to engage in empathic behaviors with their patients, learners, and interprofessional colleagues; and how building skill in empathic behavior can increase the quality of teaching and patient care while decreasing burnout and personal distress. She has facilitated improv workshops in the United States and Puerto Rico, London, Scotland and Portugal for the International Association for Communication in Healthcare, and she also uses improv to teach scientists how to talk about their work. Amy is a former actor who trained at ACT in San Francisco and The Denver Center for Performing Arts after receiving her BA in Drama, then landed in New York and Chicago. She is excited to be using her theatre knowledge and skills in her current role as an educator and researcher.

What Participants Say

• The pace at which we made our way to sophisticated scene work, and then teaching is due to great organization and clear, supportive instruction. (2013)

• I was so inspired by everyone in our group. Their care, creativity and huge hearts gave me great hope for healthcare and beyond. (2013)

• Early June was an excellent time [to schedule this]. But quite honestly, I would come on Christmas day or my wedding anniversary for this workshop. (2013)

• I thought the content and applications were extremely valuable both personally (as a way to enhance my own communication skills) and professionally as a way to move into the field of medical improv. (2014)

• It was wonderful, exhausting (in a good way), challenging, thought provoking, and fun. (2014)

• Shared input from attendees coupled with instructor presentation on a scale of 1-10 is a 1000. (2014)

• I am leaving with an experience I will remember which has provided me with specific skills and which was more fun than my average vacation. … This was one of the top 3 professional development experiences of my career. (2015)

• Great value considering effort/preparation/length of course and experience of the teachers. (2015)

• Fantastic. I have never felt so much support in any class. Incredible instructors. (2015)

• I got a broad range of tools that I can use in a variety of situations from direct patient care to teaching to team building. … An amazing experience – I grew in so many ways! (2015)

• Surpassed my expectations in content, methodology, professionalism, practicality, inspiration, potential, and vision! (2015)

Tentative Schedule

Day One

12:00-1:00pm – Registration / Check-in
1:00-2:15pm – Welcome; Opening exercises; Orientation
2:30-4:45pm – Medical Improv Class 1: Fundamentals
5:00-6:00pm – Debrief on how to teach class 1
Evening Outing: Dinner and Improv Show (e.g., Second City) – provided

Day Two

8:15-9:00am – Breakfast provided in classroom
9:00-11:15am – Medical Improv Class 2: Character
11:30am-12:15pm – Debrief on how to teach class 2
12:15-1:45pm – Lunch (on your own)
1:45-4:00pm – Medical Improv Class 3: Spontaneity / Multitasking
4:15-5:00pm – Debrief on how to teach class 3
Evening Event: Happy Hour – drinks & snacks provided (6:00-7:30)

Day Three

8:30-9:15am – Breakfast provided in classroom
9:15am-10:00am – Expertise Exchange Part 1 (Participant discussion & demonstration of current educational work)
10:15-12:30pm – Medical Improv Class 4: Emotion; Uncertainty; Clarification
12:30-1:45pm – Lunch (on your own)
1:45-2:30pm – Debrief on how to teach class 4
2:45-4:15pm – Expertise Exchange Part 2
4:15-5:30pm – Applying Medical Improv In Context – Defining Your Goals & Overcoming Your Obstacles (discussion)

Day Four

8:30-9:15am – Breakfast provided in classroom
9:15-11:30am – Medical Improv Class 5: Status, Applications
11:45am-12:30pm – Debrief on how-to-teach class 5
12:30-1:45pm – Lunch (on your own)
1:45-3:00pm – Specialized Applications
3:00-4:30pm–Teaching preparation time (working with your teaching partners)
4:30-6:30pm – Class performance by participants for each other
Evening: free

Day Five

8:30-9:15am – Breakfast provided in classroom
9:15-9:30am– Practice Teaching Orientation/Launch
9:30-11:30am – Participant practice-teaching sessions
11:30-12:30pm – Lunch provided in classroom
12:30-2:30pm – Participant practice-teaching sessions
2:45-4:00pm – Wrap-up; evaluations
4:00pm – Adjourn

Questions? Please email Katie Watson