Susan J. Sample, Associate Professor Emerita of Internal Medicine in the School of Medicine, founded and directed the Initiative in Narrative, Medicine, and Writing at the Center for Health Ethics, Arts, and Humanities at the University of Utah. She continues as the Writer-in-Residence at the Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI). She received her BA in philosophy from Whitman College and an M.F.A. in creative writing from the University of Arizona. She completed her Ph.D. in communication, focusing on rhetoric, narrative, and medicine, from the U of U. Her research explores the rhetorical ways physicians and patients use narrative, particularly how physician-trainees use narrative when writing about experiences with patients at the end of life. She taught medical humanities and reflective writing in the School of Medicine. She also was the faculty advisor for the Literature & Health Care Discussion Group, , and faculty advisor for the medical students' literary journal, Rubor: Reflections on Medicine from the Wasatch Front. She continues to facilitate the Resident Physician Writing Group. At HCI, Dr. Sample guides patients, caregivers, physicians, and staff in reflecting upon and writing about their experiences. She offers workshops as well as individual writing consultation. She is the author of a full-length poetry collection, Trapped in the Bone-House (Main Street Rag Publishing), which was selected as finalist for the 2025 Utah Book Award in Poetry; and two poetry chapbooks, Terrible Grace (2011) and Some Unsayable Blue (2019), both published by Finishing Line Press. In spring 2021, she published Voices of Teenage Transplant Survivors: Miracle-Like (Emerald Publishing), which describes poetry workshops she led for 12 years and the poems produced by the teens who had heart, liver, and kidney transplants. Her poetry has appeared in journals ranging from literary journals, including Tupelo Quarterly, to medical journals, including JAMA, Journal of Clinical Oncology, AJN, Journal of Adolescent Health, Ars Medica, and Hektoen International Journal of Medical Humanities.