Discrimination

Last year – 2020 – was the year of the pandemic. Most of us stayed home, telecommuting or taking online classes. However, hundreds of thousands of essential workers continued at their jobs, driving back and forth to work each day. Even with a drastically reduced amount of vehicles on the road, traffic fatalities increased during…

On January 12, the American College of Physicians published a position paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine, proposing a comprehensive policy framework to address racial disparity and discrimination in healthcare. The paper takes a strong position in calling for policy changes to better understand, address, and eventually remove existing health disparities due to institutional…

Sickle cell disease is an inherited red blood cell disorder in which there aren’t enough red blood cells to carry oxygen throughout the body. Typical red blood cells are round, and move easily through the blood vessels. However, with sickle cell disease, the cells are crescent-shaped (like sickles), and can get stuck in the blood…

Long-standing myths about black people are pervasive in healthcare. False notions and flat-out racism stemming all the way back to days of slavery still affect the black healthcare experience today. Do black patients have thicker skin? Less nerve endings? Does their blood coagulate more quickly? The answer to these questions is no. And the research…