FLICKR, RICK“I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.” -- Mark Twain
Prospects for understanding cancer, Alzheimer's disease, cardiovascular disease, and other afflictions have never been brighter. However, a class I teach on presentation techniques at Stanford University School of Medicine, and similar experiences at the UCLA Brain Research Institute and City of Hope National Medical Center, have made me aware of a communication crisis that threatens progress. While presentation techniques are important, the crisis is deeply rooted in a scientific culture that is losing sight of Mark Twain’s simple wisdom.
It is often acknowledged that scientists don't communicate well with the public, but increasingly they don't communicate well with each other. The typical biomedical research presentation has become a dizzying whirlwind of incomprehensible slides, presented at lightening speed and labeled with unreadable font sizes and abbreviations ...
