Blogs

As we celebrate Black History Month this month and prepare to celebrate Women’s History Month in March, I am thankful for the opportunity to reflect on my experience as a woman of color. 2016 was a year of notable achievements for women of color, even more so for black women.

Medicine is an amazing profession. Every day I use my mind to its fullest. Although I have been practicing my craft for almost 30 years now, it seems like not a day goes by that I don’t see something new.

A career in family medicine means you often have to think outside the box that is created by the traditional clinical encounter. When a patient steps into my clinic room, their chief complaint is laced with social, emotional and historical undertones.

It is traditional for everyone to anticipate the new year with resolutions or to deliberately ignore the process (that would be me), though I do try to honor my heritage with greens and black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day. The upcoming year promises to be challenging to say the least.

The first time I walked into a supermarket in Iganga, Uganda, the man behind the counter immediately started speaking to me in Hindi. I was in Uganda for two months with the Uganda Village Project, working on public health interventions with other young people.

On Nov. 16, Duke Community and Family Medicine department chair J. Lloyd Michener, M.D., announced plans to leave his role as chair as soon as a new chair could be named, to pursue national activities in community and population health. Many asked how this decision would affect the Duke Family Medicine Residency Program; I want to share with you how I have been preparing to lead during this change.

Since the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, U.S. law cannot explicitly discriminate by race. There is evidence, however, that laws are written, passed and unequally applied to perpetuate racism.

It is 2 p.m. on a beautiful, sunny day. I have this afternoon off (yea!), and I’m overdue to leave the office; but thought it would be best to check for any last minute urgent messages.  Instead, I am surprised to see a new death notification in my inbox. 

Perhaps the most educational experience I had as a medical student did not come in the classroom or while shadowing physicians; it came after my wife’s Caesarean section for our first daughter. For kicks, we asked for an itemized bill from the hospital and when it finally came in the mail we read through it, and thought it was a joke.

I discovered at a very young age that the quiet times, often right before bedtime, were the best times for problem solving, creative thinking and planning. I would spend a couple of hours after school doing homework and there would be that one geometry or trigonometry problem that would allude solving.