The Skills of a Professional Medical Artist

What is a Medical Artist

Medical artists and medical illustrators create and sell art of a medical and scientific content and to do so, will have received anatomical training and possess a comprehensive knowledge of anatomy, pathology, surgery, gross anatomy and orthopeadics, plus posses artistic design with regards to putting it all together in multimedia, scientific research, diagrams and charts, posters and leaflets and creating conceptual and general illustrations.

Qualifications of a Medical Artist

Speaking from the UK, medical artists have to be trained to a very high standard to carry out their profession, that will allow them access to hospital theatres and laboratories to visit live operations and post mortems. The process requires completing a post graduate qualification with the Medical Artists' Education Trust of Great Britain. Here artists will acquire skills across all types of media such as watercolour, pen & ink, pastel, digital and pencil techniques, whilst being taught anatomy with cadavars at the Royal College of Surgeon's of England.

Once qualified the medical artists become accredited as a Registered Medical Illustration Practitioner and join as a professional member of the Medical Artists' Association of Great Britain. By doing so they offer a unique service and can use their skills to communicate complex medical concepts in a clear visual manner. Sensitive to ethical issues, medical artists understand patient care and strive towards improving patients' understanding of their care. The medical illustrations are used in many areas such as medical or scientific publications, anatomy text books, advertisements, editorials, patient information posters, journals and papers and web and online use.

What is a Medical Legal Artist or Medico-Legal Artist

Medical legal artists complete the same medical illustrations, however, for a specific audience. This includes completing the work for insurance companies, health care institutions and medical product manufacturers. Or most directly UK solicitors (USA - lawyers) for either the plaintiff or the defense. The solicitors represent victims of personal, fatal or accidental injury and will commission a medical legal artist (medico-legal artist) to produce what's called 'courtroom exhibits'. These illustrations are created directly from the patient's own doctors reports and aim to explain the injury in a visual manner, to support the victims claim. This is because more often than not the medical information is complicated, comes as long written reports, includes medical terminolgy and abbreviations and so it has been proven that a visual interpretation has a far better impact. Those viewing the illustrations include all parties for the defense and plaintiff, the solicitors, insurance companies and even a jury and judge if the claim has reached as far as a courtroom.