We do not always rage against the dying of the light. Sometimes, we allow the light to fade gently, with grace, in the presence of love.

Nezienwa Ezenwa reflects on a patient who demonstrated that medicine is not just about defying death. It is about honoring life.

This essay placed first in the 2025 Hope Babette Tang Humanism in Healthcare Essay Contest and was published in the December 2025 issue of Academic Medicine. Read the essay at academicmedicine.org.

Something shifted after that conversation. It wasn't a dramatic overnight change, but it was there—the slightest flicker of fight in him again. He started pushing himself a little more, engaging in physical therapy instead of just going through the motions. He cracked a joke with the nurses.

Roz Agheli reflects on a patient who was kept alive by medicine but kept fighting because of hope.

This essay placed first in the 2025 Hope Babette Tang Humanism in Healthcare Essay Contest and was published in the December 2025 issue of Academic Medicine. Read the essay at academicmedicine.org.

Discussing Academic Medicine's and MedEdPORTAL's new policy guiding the use of AI tools in the peer review process are editors-in-chief Laura Roberts, MD, MA, and Lauren Maggio, PhD, MS(LIS), Academic Medicine associate editor Krisztina Fischer, MD, PhD, MMSc, and AAMC director of journals Mary Beth DeVilbiss. They provide an overview of the journals' new policy and use a series of common peer review scenarios to explore what's appropriate, what's not, and what you should think about before using AI as a reviewer.

Check out the resources discussed, including the journals' AI policies for reviewers and authors, and access the episode transcript at academicmedicineblog.org.