Posted on 01/03/2017 7:11:01 PM PST by bkopto
Washington, DC-based school administrator Akela Stanfield is quite familiar with that distrust. She spent a year being stereotyped by and receiving few answers from a string of doctors while trying to get to the bottom of the discomfort she'd been experiencing.
"Being a black female who is overweight automatically puts you in a diabetic category," she says. "They kept telling me I was 'pre-diabetic,' and I took way too many glucose tests. They were hunting for diabetes. I used to hate it—they would focus on it so much when I simply did not have diabetes."
These stressful dealings with white male doctors made appointments—none of which resulted in a successful diagnosis—a source of dread. But her outlook on healthcare changed during an appointment for the same ongoing issues when her primary doctor was unavailable, causing a life-changing encounter with a black female doctor who was filling in.
"That was the most enlightening 60 minutes of my life," Stanfield says.
SNIP
Even with extensive studies on racial bias and America's troubled past with black folks and medical treatment, the difference often boils down to the comfort of knowing your doctor understands the uniqueness, importance, and nuances of your culture and lived experiences.
"Any time you don't have to explain the subtleties of your world, your comfort increases. It doesn't seem as strange to explain to your fellow black American doctor why it's hard to stick to your new cardiac diet when Big Mama is inviting you to Sunday dinner," Creighton says of the comfort that comes with familiarity. "And the micro-aggressions that can occur are deadly to building rapport and trust, the same way it is in any working relationship."
(Excerpt) Read more at tonic.vice.com ...
But if I said I’m white and my doctor should be too, I’d be called a racist.......
Well, I am a male and prefer my doctor to be female. I don’t care her skin color as long as she is educated in the US and speaks native American English. People should see who they prefer and leave the racism and all at home.
>>Being a black female who is overweight automatically puts you in a diabetic category,<<
Yes.
They call that a “diagnostic” based on “medical science.”
ALL obese people are diagnosed as pre-diabetic and rightly so. It may be that blacks also tend towards diabetes. The combination is an almost certainty.
Medical schools will soon have to start teaching specialty courses in treatment of black women, in contrast to treatment of humans in general.
We’re all the same and deserve to be treated the same, right up until some perpetually aggrieved person and/or group demands to be treated differently. But only treat them differently with regard to the things they specify. treat them the same about everything else. Until they change the rules again.
Sheesh!
Pre-diabetic? Post-sane.
Don’t laugh.
There is now a new thing called “cultural competence” and med schools must show they teach it.
I don’t get the relevance of that photo.
As a young-ish celibate female, most doctors I see want to test me for pregnancy and STDs. It has nothing to do with skin color, it has to do with doctors who put so much trust in statistics that they forget the patient is an individual.
Find a doctor who actually listens, and a lot of the aggravation goes away.
Only an idiot want “affirmative action” when it comes to life and death decisions. I am white and, if I needed a neurosurgeon, I would be more than happy to have Ben Carson to preform surgery. Abilityand character, not color or religion, should drive our decisions.
I wouldn’t want a young g person for a doctor. No children like Doogie Hauser. Want the see some grey hair.
Female Doctor: “You’ll have to stop masturbating.”
Male patient: “Why and for how long?”
Female Doctor: “At least for 10 minutes because I am trying to examine you now.”
I don’t know either, but when i saw it it made me happy all over.
My doctor always says I’m pre-diabetic.
What does he know?
My physiology doesn’t fit anything normal and it hasn’t changed since I joined the Navy in 1962.
In 1962 the military doctors made me get a note from 2 civilian specialists before they’d take me.
My heart rate is 40, my blood pressure is 75/45, my total cholesterol is 85, my glucose is 101, and my HDL is 18.
It usually takes a doctor about 3 to 4 years to come to grips with the fact that I’m healthy with abnormal system.
I’m competent and my doctor should be too.
Standards are rayciss. We should outlaw them.
There are many black doctors in Africa. Flights leaving every day. Ships too.
#blackdocsmatter
It means “pack your bags you dumb snowflake, and GTFO!”
The affirmative action she deserves.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.