Every Word and Action: Using Cinemeducation to Enhance Medical Students’ Awareness of and Upstander Responses to Disability Microaggressions

Introduction: Medical students are rarely given structured opportunities to explore how persons with disabilities (PwD) experience subtle discrimination, especially in clinical or academic settings. Despite the inclusion of disability-related competencies in medical school curriculum, microaggressions remain insufficiently addressed. This activity sought to create a reflective, immersive learning space to sensitize first-year medical students to microaggressions against PwD through a 2-day cinemeducation-based intervention. Methods: One hundred fifty first-year medical students participated in two 3-hour faculty-facilitated small-group activities using curated film clips aligned with 12 identified themes of microaggressions against PwD. Each session combined film viewing, self-reflection, and structured group dialogues. Students maintained personal diaries for 6 months, which are long-term reflective documentation tools, to document their awareness, responses, and behavioral changes. Mixed-methods evaluation included pre-/posttests, confidence rating scales, session feedback, and semistructured interviews. Results: < .0001), suggesting early gains in awareness and response. Thematic analysis revealed learners' increased self-awareness, empathy, and willingness to act as upstanders. Students reported shifts in language use, peer education efforts, and personal growth. The diaries served as a sustained reflective tool that reinforced students' commitments to inclusive practice. Discussion: This activity effectively bridged affective and cognitive learning. Moving beyond lecture-based instruction invited students to engage with the lived experiences of disability in a humanized and emotionally resonant manner. Cinemeducation, when embedded within a longitudinal reflective framework, holds transformative potential to promote disability inclusion and ethical awareness in medical education.