Books:
- Ensign, J. (August 9, 2021) Skid Road: On the Frontier of Health and Homelessness in an American City (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.)
- Ensign, J. (July 16, 2018) Soul Stories: Voices from the Margins (San Fransisco: University of California Medical Humanities Press).
- Ensign, J. (August 2016) Catching Homelessness: A Nurse’s Story of Falling Through the Safety Net (Berkeley: She Writes Press). Named the University of Washington Health Sciences Common Book for academic year 2016/2017. Named the American Journal of Nursing 2017 Book of the Year for creative works.
Essays:
- Ensign, J. (February 23, 2018) “Chaos” mixed media art published in Pulse: Voices From the Heart of Medicine.
- Ensign, J. (February 7, 2018). “Witnessing the Power of Story” in Columbia University’s Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine, Crossroads.
- Ensign, J. (Fall 2017) “Witness: On Telling“ in Columbia University’s Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine.
- Ensign, J. (June 22, 2017) “The Hospital on Profanity Hill—A History of Harborview Hospital (Seattle)” in HistoryLink.org, essay #20393.
- Ensign, J. (June 2017) “Perspective” in Journal of Medical Humanities.
- Ensign, J. (February 2017) “Degree of Latitude” in Manifest-Station.
- Ensign, J. (January 2017/ Prepared August 2016) National Health Care for the Homeless Council’s Special Report “National Health Care for the Homeless: A Vision of Health for All.”
- Ensign, J. (November 2016) “Listen, Carefully” in Electric Literature/Okey-Panky.
- Ensign, J. (Fall 2016) “Way Out; Way Home” in Raven Chronicles Journal vol. 23: Jack Straw Writers Program, 1997-2016.
- Ensign, J. (August 2016) Catching Homelessness: A Nurse’s Story of Falling Through the Safety Net (Berkeley: She Writes Press). Named the University of Washington Health Sciences Common Book for academic year 2016/2017. Named the American Journal of Nursing 2017 Book of the Year for creative works.
- Ensign, J. (Spring 2016) “Medical Maze” in Columbia University’s Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine.
- Ensign, J. (May 2016). “Greyhound Therapy” in the Front Porch Journal, Issue 32.
- Ensign, J. (Winter 2015). “Listen Carefully” 55-word story included in Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, Special Issue: Diagnosis, Johns Hopkins University Press, p. 32.
- Ensign, J. (June 2015) “Fossicking the Ten Essentials” published in Traveler’s Tales/Travel to Go, Number 16. Here is a link to the pdf version of the entire essay: “Fossicking the Ten Essentials.” And by-the-way, fossicking is an Australian and New Zealand term for ‘rummaging’ and ‘prospecting,’and specifically for ‘picking over the abandoned workings’ (of gold, precious stones, and fossils).
- Ensign, J. (Spring 2015) “The Hospital on Profanity Hill” published in Hektoen International.
- Ensign, J. (June 19, 2014) “It Was Time to Proclaim Myself a Wounded Healer” (repost of essay below). KevinMD.
- Ensign, J. (May 30, 2014) “No Place Like Home(less)” essay published in Pulse: Voices From the Heart of Medicine. Albert Einstein College of Medicine. (Reprinted on KevinMD).
- Ensign, J. (Spring 2014) “Steps to Footcare” (fiction) published in Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine. Columbia University Program of Narrative Medicine.
- Ensign, J. (May 17, 2013) “On the Road” essay published in Pulse: Voices From the Heart of Medicine. Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
- Ensign, J. (May 2013) “Soul Story” essay published in Jack Straw Writers Anthology, volume 17. Jack Straw interview and reading here.
- Ensign, J. (April 2013) “Next of Kin” essay in the anthology I Wasn’t Strong Like This When I Started Out: True Stories of Becoming a Nurse, edited by Lee Gutkind, In Truth Press.
- Ensign, J. (Spring 2013). Home Death. Johns Hopkins Public Health Magazine.
- Ensign, J. (November 2012). Homeless Ghosts. University of Iowa‘s
Examined Life Journal.
- Ensign, J. (April 2011). Reprint/excerpt of Gone South in The Daily Palette, University of Iowa.
- Ensign, J. (Spring 2011). Gone South. Silk Road, v6.1, pp 8-16.
- Ensign, J. (November 2000). Sibling Rivalry. The Sun.
- Ensign (Bowdler), J. (1989) Touched by AIDS. Oberlin Alumni Magazine.
- Ensign, BJ. (1979). Waldamere and Wally. Parents Anonymous of Delaware.
Academic publications with a narrative focus:
- Ensign, J. and Ammerman, S.(2008). Ethical Issues in Research with Homeless Youths. Journal of Advanced Nursing. 62(3):365-372.
- Ensign, J. (2004). Quality of care: The views of homeless youth. Health Services Research. 39(4):695-708.
- Ensign, J & Bell, M. (2004). EnsignBell2004 Qualitative Health Research. 14(9):1239-1254.
- Ensign, J & Panke, A. (2002). Bridges and barriers to care: Voices of homeless female adolescent youth in Seattle, Washington, USA. Journal of Advanced Nursing. 37(2):166-172.
- Barry, P., Ensign, J, Lipke, S. (2002). Embracing street culture: Fitting health care into the lives of street youth. Journal of Transcultural Nursing. 13(2):145-152.
- Ensign, J. (2001). “Shut up and listen”: Feminist health care with out-of-the-mainstream adolescent females. Issues in Comprehensive Pediatric Nursing. 24(2):71-84.
Do you write anywhere about finding your voice? How did this come to be a writing practice for you? In my own ten year journey through brain injury, autoimmune disease, and homelessness, I’ve kept Helene Cixous as a touch stone. I used my training as an actor to place myself in my own, fractured narrative. I used my work as a rehabilitative horse trainer to explore the uses of constraint as a tool for my own healing. And I used my experience as a standardized patient to gain traction in clinical settings that have no algorithm for me. But it was the voice in my head that whispered itraconazole that finally cracked the ddx I had to work alone. And until I read you, I thought I was the only person in the world to think about, and write about my experience this way.