Booster Shot Comics

Next week! Alex and Gary will be the keynote speakers at the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education - ACCME annual meeting! We're going to be talking about the formal elements of comics, and how we apply these elements to our work at Booster Shot Comics for health communication! We'll also be doing a hands-on workshop as well!

Join us on May 6–8 in Chicago to kick things off with an opening keynote that reimagines how we learn—and care.

🗓 Wednesday, May 6
🎤 Alex Thomas, MD & Gary Ashwal, MA

Discover Graphic Medicine, an evidence-based approach using comics and visual storytelling to make learning more engaging, empathetic, and effective. Hands-on, practical, and no drawing skills required.

➡️Register: accmemeeting.org

Wow! What amazing few days! My brain is still buzzing and my hand is still cramping!

The Case of the Human : Medicine, Humanities, and the
Boundaries of Knowledge was a conference like no other. Hosted by the The Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society, I was joined by 4 other amazing comics artists (Christine Dianne Guiyangco, Caroline Hu( ), MK Czerwiec and Matteo Farinella ) to (along with a facilitator) work with experts from across various fields to create collaborative comics based on their unique case studies.

I created a comic with Mirko Pasquini, PhD from the University of Gothenburg about a difficult case of pain management in the ED based on his extensive first-hand ethnographic field work.

I also worked with Nita Karnik Lee, MD, MPH and her amazing multidisciplinary Gynecology Oncology team at University of Chicago to create a comic mural based on a patient’s treatment journey through cervical cancer. A hilarious aside was that one of the team members coincidently was actually a patient of mine. After we both shook off our astonishment, we got to work! I told them “This is why I’m not in clinic on Fridays!” Multi-hyphenate life 4 Eva!

A big thanks to Brian Callender MD for organizing this amazing exploration and for inviting me along!

MK Czerwiec and I are up to episode 7 of the Graphic Medicine Monthly roundup podcast! This month, we interview Brian Fies about his amazing graphic novel "Mom's Cancer."

We talk about new epilogue Brian added to this 20th anniversary edition of Mom's Cancer, bringing a powerful conclusion to the story he started as a webcomic over 20 years ago. We also pick his brain about his process and reflections of the legacy of this groundbreaking work of

You can also see the full playlist of previous episodes here: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFCWIYvT0x_p3QVBKcniH0qGU1StrDAS1&si=go-2So3BNHCdC4An

https://youtu.be/WgVe_Vts0a8?si=rrsLkcQ4kXhwDua7

Graphic Medicine Podcast Monthly Round ep:7 (guest: Brian Fies) The seventh episode of our monthly roundup podcast- the podcast for updates in Graphic Medicine, interviews and more! Today we interview Brian Fies on the 2...

The rumors are true! We are working on a themed sequel to ! Today we did some recording with the incredibly talented - voice of LUCY THE LUNCHBOX! A huge thank you to Dave, Alex and the rest of the team at who made the session incredibly productive, seamless and fun! I even got to record in the booth for a few narrator lines myself! They’ve worked with some amazing talent here and I tried my best to live up to a “John Goodman” standard! What a day!

www.MySCDstory.org won another award! We are happy to announce that MySCDstory.org received a Gold Award in the website category of the Season 3 DANDA (Design+Aesthetics Awards) program!

www.MySCDstory.org is a digital tool for people considering treatment options for sickle cell disease. We produced this project for the Sickle Cell Disease Gene Therapy Working Group led by Liza-Marie (Liza) Johnson MD, MPH, MSB, HEC-C and Akshay Sharma. Special thanks to the patients and families who gave their time and input throughout the development process.

Read the full press release here- https://www.boostershotmedia.com/news/myscdstory-awards-press-release-2025-08-18.pdf

MK and Alex started a new monthly Graphic Medicine Monthly Roundup Podcast! Our inaugural episode features an interview with cartoonist and Tom Hart from The Sequential Artists Workshop ( https://www.facebook.com/sequentialartistsworkshop/ ) who will be co-hosting the SAW+Graphic Medicine Online Summit which starts tonight! The 2025 GMIC Awards will be announced tomorrow! Click below for more info!!

Graphic Medicine Podcast Monthly Roundup | Graphic Medicine Alex Thomas & MK Czerwiec host a new feature on the GM Podcast: Monthly Roundup! For our inaugural episode we are joined by SAW’s Tom Hart. Shownotes: Info about the Graphic Medicine Summit here. Schedule and individual session registrations available at that link. You can directly register for al...

Vaccine ingredients (such as aluminum) have long been a point of concern with those unsure or skeptical about vaccines.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (the US secretary of Health and Human Services) has repeatedly expressed concerns about the presence of aluminum in vaccines, claiming it's responsible for a range of childhood illnesses, including food allergies, autism, and depression, stating that it is "extremely neurotoxic".

In a 2021 interview, Kennedy stated, "You wonder why a whole generation of children is allergic to stuff. It's because we're inducing allergies, pumping them full of aluminum".

As a pediatric allergist/immunologist, I can confidently tell you he's dead wrong. But don't just take my word for it- we have data we can rely on.

This week a study of MORE THAN A MILLION people was published that showed there was NO LINK found in aluminum in vaccines and risk of more than 50 chronic conditions (including allergies, asthma, autism and autoimmune disease). https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/ANNALS-25-00997

Here is a video we made which explains WHY aluminum is such an important component of some vaccines and why it is completely harmless. In our immunization analogy, the vaccine is the immune system coach and the aluminum is like a celebrity trainer that comes in to really focus the training.

Aluminum is one of the most common elements in the natural world. Also there's more than twice the amount of aluminum in the breast milk (and ten times the amount in the formula) a baby drinks in the first 6 months of life than in all the vaccines they will receive in that time.

I know it can be incredibly confusing when we can't rely on our elected (and appointed) officials to tell us the truth. Thankfully we have science on our side to shed the light. The goal of these videos is to make this wealth of data more understandable for everyone.

https://youtu.be/u2cQVHxA5hk

Why Is There ALUMINUM In Some Vaccines? (Helping Families Understand Childhood Immunizations) Many parents seeking vaccine information have questions about vaccine safety. There is a lot of concern and confusion about some ingredients in vaccines. ...

This is one of my favorites from our series about vaccines we made with Boost Oregon! Here we get into the nitty gritty about how vaccines work compared to antibiotics (flashing back to a time before vaccines) and why it is so freaking amazing!

A time of pediatric wards filled of kids with bacterial meningitis was not that long ago and we’re headed in that direction if we don’t understand/respect the years of scientific evidence behind vaccines. Let’s not be a victim of our own success.

Yes, unvaccinated children can survive even serious infections, but at what cost? With a well-trained immune system, a potentially grueling fight, painful symptoms and antibiotics that may cause additional side effects can all be avoided. A vaccinated immune system fights off these infections without you even knowing a fight had occurred!

How Do Vaccines Work? (Helping Families Understand Childhood Immunizations) Many parents seeking vaccine information have questions about vaccine safety. But how do vaccines actually work? A time of pediatric wards filled of kids...

Why so many vaccines?? Another common misconception is that the number of vaccines given to a young child "overwhelm" their immune system and that less should be given.

HHS Secretary RFK Jr has has frequently criticized the number of vaccines in the current schedule compared to when he was a child. He's correct that there are more, but he's very wrong about it being a bad thing. When he was a child, there was no vaccine for meningitis, hepatitis A, mumps, hepatitis B, rotavirus, pneumococcus, measles, influenza, HPV, rubella, or chicken pox. Kids' immune systems were still exposed to all of these pathogens, and there was much more illness (and morbidity and mortality) associated with those infections. With immunizations, kids' immune systems are safely trained to fight these pathogens..... and they are definitely up to the challenge! So by limiting the number of vaccines, you are not doing the immune system any favors, but giving them less tools to stay robust and healthy.

This video explains why the number of vaccines given are important to protect kids from the many dangerous pathogens around us.

Why So Many Vaccines? (Helping Families Understand Childhood Immunizations) Many parents seeking vaccine information have questions about vaccine safety. A common concern is the number of vaccines that are recommended for children....

One common question I get from the parents of my youngest patients in my allergy/immunology practice is "Why do vaccines need to be given to babies?" In this video made with Boost Oregon, we explain why there is a window of time where vaccines are the most necessary for developing immune systems. Deviating from the recommended timing of vaccines can potentially miss the optimal time to support a child's immune system as their protective maternal antibodies fade away. These expert recommendations existed for a reason, y'all!

Why Are Vaccines Given to Babies? (Helping Families Understand Childhood Immunizations) Many parents seeking vaccine information have questions about vaccine safety. Here we explain why the timing of vaccines important to make sure babies are ...