A Unique Perspective

There’s been a lot of talk lately about the health care disparities experienced by minorities in our population.  It is important to take note of those things.  It’s important to take note of the fact that African-Americans are disproportionately suffering from Covid-19.  But not just from Covid-19.  Minorities are more likely to suffer from the full gamut of diseases as opposed to their white counterparts.  Covid-19 just brought this problem to light.  

As a result, there has been some discussion about the unfair treatment of minorities and unequal access to healthcare in a time of global pandemic.  This climate has allowed for a spark of injustice to blaze like wildfire.  

However I want to focus my attention on people that I think are not necessarily considered.  These are people that have been on the front lines of Covid-19.  These are people that have seen firsthand the highs and lows of taking care of patients.  They experience the joy and excitement of saving someone’s life from a deadly disease.  They’ve also experienced sadness and anger associated with losing someone under their care.  I am of course talking about the healthcare workers all across America. 

“Well of course we’ve been thinking of them!”  

Well slow down.  Do you think that’s a thoughtful answer?  

When you close your eyes and picture the staff, who do you see?  How about the x-ray technician?  The ventilator technician?  The phlebotomist? The medical lab technician?  The nurses?  In your mind’s eye, who do you see when the doctor arrives to take care of your loved ones?  Picture them wearing their white coats.  The symbol of healers across all fields of the medical profession. 

Now imagine they’re black.  

A Perspective Shift

I pulled this thought-reversal from the movie, “A Time to Kill”.  Matthew McConaughey pulls off the most convincing and heart-felt closing argument by asking the predominantly white jury to visualize the atrocious crime that took a black girl’s life.  Then he asked them to imagine that this innocent little girl is white.  

My rendition was probably not as impactful as Matthew’s, but I’m betting that many people often envision our healthcare workers to be white; or at the very least, envision them to look exactly like us. Our thoughts tend to center around the assumption that other people look like us. We then begin to appreciate the futility of racism when someone does not look like us and jars these thoughts.  We begin to expand our humanity when we extend our consciousness to become all-inclusive.  

African-American doctors and healthcare workers are perhaps the most human people on the planet.  They experience racism on a daily basis.  Despite the clear letters that follow their names on white coats, many are in disbelief and seem to require verbal confirmation of their education; as if to imply that a black man or woman could never be a healthcare professional and a distinguished member of society.  

With all our forward-thinking pioneers of equal rights throughout the years of our young country, we still have African-American doctors experiencing this bizarre scenario.  Most doctors don’t have to contend with subtly racial comments while maintaining the level of professionalism befitting the rank of “Doctor”.  They must cope with a daily diet of mental trauma and insults perpetuated by their unwitting white peers and colleagues while performing at the level expected of them.  If their white counter-parts are sensitive to their plight, they may fear the retribution of upsetting the established status quo.

As a doctor, they see the health care disparities first hand.  They treat minorities more often than not.  Minorities with which they can often self-identify.  They see themselves within the people they treat.  And they worry that this could be their loved ones.  Perhaps this realization makes them the superb doctors that they are because they are always reminded to place their humanity above all else.  They treat patients with the love, care, and respect that they would afford to their own family members.  

During my rotations I can count all the African-American doctors I’ve worked with on one hand.  Yet I’ve lost count of the innumerable African-American patients under my care alone. How is that possible? I could not perceive this blatant disparity at the time. 

It’s in the Eyes

However I feel this continues to be a daily reality of pain to healthcare workers that could self-identify with their patients.  When these patients are lost, there’s a more visceral reaction.  Emotions are magnified.  They obviously care deeply for any and all of their patients. However when you can see your own father or mother, wife or husband, son or daughter in the eyes of the patient under your care, there is an ebullient ache that wells up from deep within.  A place so deep, you are surprised to discover the new depths of your core.

African-American doctors already put up with this mental assault on their psyches every single day of their lives.  Why?  African-Americans are more prone to disease through no fault of their own.  They are prone due to outdated societal systems that do not favor minorities. Our predecessors set up a healthcare system in which African-American healthcare workers have painstakingly earned their position multiple times more than their white counterparts.  

Imagine working 100 times harder just to prove you are only equal.  And even then, black healthcare workers can’t seem to catch a break.  They overcome unimaginable life situations to be granted the opportunity they have achieved.  

Yet they are still profiled within the hospital walls or simply driving to work.  They hear about the sad and terrible news of people like George Floyd, Ahmaud Aubrey, and Breonna Taylor who have all died senselessly and unjustly.  These doctors have in the back of their minds that their family could have easily been the latest headline.  The honed instinct of the doctor within them would have leapt into action!  Administer CPR, establish an airway, start IV fluids and do the work of a doctor… A healer… To save lives.  

Is it any wonder these professionals are torn in two?  

What’s Changed?

This injustice is nothing new.  It has simply been brought to light once more.  Just because we’re finally talking about it doesn’t change reality for them or for us.  Action is required.  Policy changes are required.  And these are required in the fundamental belief system that has been instantiated upon our subconscious from birth.  We might not think ourselves racist or think that we would actively be racist.  However years of subtle conditioning will introduce these concepts to our impressionable brains.  If we are to be truthful with ourselves, racist thoughts cross our minds from time to time. 

It is important to note that you are NOT your thoughts.   

What does this mean?  This means that while you might not have control over the thoughts that cross your mind, you DO have the control to observe these thoughts.  If a thought seems erroneous and contrary to your values, you have the ability to examine that thought.  

1. Systematically acknowledge that the thought occurred.  Otherwise it can continue to hide in obscurity.  When you acknowledge it, you shed light upon it like a microscope. 
2. Analyze that thought.  Ask yourself if you know where it came from.  A TV show you recently saw?  An off-hand comment you might have heard?  Observing another person being treated a certain way? 
3. Alter that thought to be more aligned with your values. 
4. If necessary, root it from your mind.  Replace it with a thought you’ve handcrafted to be more true to yourself and the way you choose to interact with the world.  

In this way, we need not let our thoughts run our lives.  We can run our lives and our thoughts to take the actions we desire.

Work Remains

The truly bizarre thing is that while systemic racism has taken center stage, African Americans are still dying in communities as well as in hospitals.  This is a testament to how endemic this situation is.  We are still trapped within the thought-processes of our predecessors.  However rather than continue to live in blissful ignorance of their shadows, we have this opportunity to rise up upon their shoulders and create a beautiful world.  

I am trying my hardest to understand the nature of this beast. You have just read my attempt to develop an appreciation from an angle I have not considered in the past. Therefore I would like to leave you with the thoughts and ideas of people who completely understand the situation.

I want to leave you with some very intriguing articles by Jessica Gold from Forbes.  Check them out here and here.  Jessica has brought a truly profound idea to fruition!  The amazing doctors in her articles show a perspective rarely seen and therefore underappreciated.  Please take some time to read their words and think about why they feel compelled to choose those exact words to convey to the world.