storytelling contest cup

Best of the Storytelling Contest

UCSF Storytellers Take Top Honors

Creativity, curiosity and extraordinary storytelling are on full display in the winners of the eighth annual Synapse Storytelling Contest, with this year’s honorees transforming experiences in medicine, science, nature, identity and everyday life into memorable works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry...

August 25, 2026

Campus

Old man on bench

Paused

February 8, 2020

Seated in plain sight he is invisible The passersby halt for a moment to note That something might be there...

Patient Report (an excerpt)

February 3, 2020

******* is a 50-year-old *******-speaking WOMAN, Present in the EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT. Immigrant from El Salvador.

Closing The Cut

January 30, 2020

With one hand pressed over the gash above my left eye in an effort to provide some hemostasis, I hurriedly...

Man at a crossroads

Choices

January 22, 2020

They tell us we have options innumerable An unseen multiple choice test, and even Better - we do the grading...

Clinic Chronicles

January 14, 2020

“When does the Clinic open?” I hear amongst the bustle as I walk down the crowded aisles of beds at...

atomos-1

Patience

November 8, 2019

Editor's note: Ninad Bhat's "Patience" took second place in the Synapse Storytelling Contest creative writing, poetry category. The room is...

Crazy Grad Stories

October 16, 2019

“I did a dose response curve using bleach. To my great delight, it worked perfectly! It was the most potent...

Ode to a Code Blue

October 14, 2019

My first day on rotations was your last day on earth. This morning when you woke up, did you think...

1-aint_no_fish

Ain't No Fish

October 12, 2019

Sunday morning in Monterey Bay, no tail tip on the horizon so far. The conversation was about transgenic zebra fishes...