Black patients tend to get poorer care and have worse health outcomes than white patients with the exact same illnesses, so it's little wonder that some struggle to put much stock in medical advice now. “You do not necessarily follow what the system which has been oppressive is asking of you,” Assari says. “If you do, you are ‘acting white,’ which there is some stigma around.” In fact, according to Stuart Grande, a medical sociologist at the University of Minnesota, patients tend to do better when matched with a physician whose race matches their own. It’s not a matter of some ghoulish white physicians deliberately underserving their black patients, it’s the subtler things: finding the patients’ symptoms credible, pursuing more aggressive forms of treatment, and the patient’s willingness to trust in and carry out a doctor’s recommendations. That’s why efforts like Ala Stanford’s, bringing black doctors to care for the black community, are so valuable.
top of page
bottom of page
you are right